


Black Feathers

by Iwovepizza



Series: Black Feathers Series [1]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: (not from supernatural), Abuse, Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angel Hunter Annabeth, Angel Hunter Jason, Angel Hunter Will, Angel Hunters, Angel Percy, Angel Wings, Angels, Angst with a Happy Ending, ArchAngel Michael - Freeform, Archangels, BAMF Annabeth, BAMF Jason, BAMF Nico, BAMF Percy, Beating, Blood and Gore, Caring Annabeth, Demons, Drug Addiction, Drug Dealing, Drug Withdrawal, Edited, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fallen Angel Nico, Fallen Angels, Heaven, Hell, Hurt Percy, Illegal Activities, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jason & Percy Brotp, M/M, Multi, Mutual Pining, Nico Feels, Non-Consensual Drug Use, One-Sided Attraction, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Overdosing, Pining Annabeth, Pining Percy, Protective Jason, Protective Nico, Protective Will, Protective annabeth, Sad Nico, Sad Percy, Starvation, Suicide Attempt, Violence, Whipping, Will have a sequel, With Percabeth in it, hurt jason
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-16
Updated: 2016-08-10
Packaged: 2018-06-02 11:18:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 109,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6564163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iwovepizza/pseuds/Iwovepizza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Golden Swords is an association that is known for trapping angels and taking their wings. Jason Grace is a part of this organization, but only so he can pay off his debts with the profit he makes by selling the wings on the black market. When he meets an angel named Perseus with huge black wings that will fetch a high price, what will happen if he befriends him?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Boy in the Sparks

**Author's Note:**

> This story was successful on fanfiction.net, so I decided to post it onto here! There will be changes as I alter the story to make it better from the original, taking the constructive criticism from the reviews, so I hope that this'll be better!  
> Note that this story is unbeta'd and all mistakes are my own.  
> Also note that there will be a sequel.

            Jason had a secret.

            A dark, dirty little secret.

            Only problem was that it wasn’t really so little.

            This secret kept him looking over his shoulder, kept him on his toes, and shivers arc up and down his spine when he was alone and without protection. He wasn’t what most would consider skittish, but there was a certain wariness about him that would remind one of a wild animal. Jason lived in a world of eat or be eaten, and in this world he was a coyote. He was swift and crafty, able to pick off the mice and the deer, but the wolves and mountain lions watched him from the shadows, waiting for him to make a misstep before they lunged. His reflexes were astounding, but his demeanor was like a wave of battle calm; he acted like an experienced soldier in the heat of a battle, level-headed and making each of his moves precise and lethal. People from Jason’s day jobs whispered of him, of his sharp, agile movements and of his even sharper tongue. Nobody knew much about him except from the fact that he was like everyone else in this god forsaken part of the city; scraping along and doing anything for that extra wad of bills.

            They said that he dealt in drugs, which wasn’t a surprise since the whisperers themselves usually dealt in drugs themselves, and that would explain how swift on his feet he was, how calm he always managed to be, even when someone, whether it be a customer, a coworker, or his boss, was trying their best to pull an emotion out of him. They said he was hooked on speed and steroids and was taking a whole heap of other drugs to keep his reactions minimal and measured. Others thought that he was part of a gang and had to be vigilant and agile in order to fend off members of rival gangs. That was true in a way, but Jason never spoke unless spoken to, never gave away information about himself, and he was a clouded mystery that everyone was trying to solve, though they never got very far.

            Some tried following him home, only for him to turn a corner and disappear into thin air. Some tried to confront him, both at work and after his shift was over, but the former were met with a reserved and chilling distance while the latter were never the same. They refused to talk about what had happened, never participating in gossip again and avoiding Jason like he was the plague. A few even quit their jobs not an hour after their meeting with the blond-haired, blue-eyed teen, but one of the handful of things they did say was to stop. To forget Jason exists and only interact when they had to. Because if Jason was capable of showing remorse or sadness or even mercy, he didn’t show it. The workers all thought they were joking, but the haunted look that their colleges and acquaintances boasted told them otherwise.

            They didn’t know the whole story, however, wouldn’t _believe_ the whole story. If they knew just what Jason was up to, they’d label him a demon and a beast, one incapable of showing feelings, whether it be joy or depression or sympathy. But sympathy was a weakness. It’s what would get you killed in Jason’s line of work, because if you show even the slightest hint of pity, the hunter will become the hunted. They will latch onto it in a death grip, reel you in with sad words and baleful stares and unimaginable beauty, their voices sirens’ songs that would lure the unaware to their deaths, and once you decided to let them out of the trap they would tear you to shreds, piece by tiny piece, until you were just a patchwork on the ground of whatever alley was closest. Perhaps one would be incredulous; whatever big game that Jason was hunting certainly wouldn’t talk, and even though lions, tigers, and bears were all deadly, none of them made their homes in this decrepit district of the city. No, what Jason hunting was far, far worse, and they could do a great deal more than just shred you physically.

            To get to the point, Jason was hunting angels.

            Most would cry for him to be sent to hell, call for his blood and for his eternal damnation. Not even the cruelest would dare to hunt angels in such a manner, and those who would either didn’t know of their existence or were just too fearful of an untimely, and rather painful, death. Jason didn’t care, though, and tried to ignore the immoral side in favor of the reasoning behind it; he needed to support his family, needed to keep them going so they weren’t sucked into the darkness that was drifting behind them. Besides, it wasn’t like Jason was actually killing the angels. Angels were immortal, practically untouched by minute things like aging, and their wounds healed relatively fast depending on its severity. All that Jason wanted was their wings.

            He and his older sister, Thalia, had been drowning in poverty and debt their entire lives. Ever since their father left and their mother, an alcoholic, had passed on (not before draining their savings until all their credit cards were maxed and they were hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt), every day had been a struggle to earn money. Jason worked two jobs during the day, one as a waiter and the other as a cashier in the local Walmart. It wasn’t that easy to find a job since he’d been forced to drop out of high school, and he had so little money that the thought of college couldn’t haunt him in even his wildest dreams. Both jobs didn’t give him much of a profit and he spent every single dollar that he’d ever made working on paying off the crippling balance that was due. With the combined salary of his sister’s two jobs, they were paying it off little by little. These jobs were strictly for paying off the debt; they couldn’t afford to buy new things if it meant that the debt could be paid off as soon as possible without them.

            “Hello, young man,” came a very rich and rather husky voice from Jason’s right, causing him to jump. He turned to see Father Rick standing next to him, and his eyebrows climbed up to his hairline as he regarded the priest’s expectant look. Only then did Jason realize that he was looking for a response.

            “Um…hello,” he replied, his voice a bit on the raspy side but otherwise portraying absolutely nothing about Jason whatsoever. The Father smiled softly at him and gestured to the open space next to Jason on the pew.

            “May I sit?” he asked, and the teen knew it would be a bit rude to deny him, considering that this church was technically “God’s house” and the priest was the housekeeper.

            “Uh, yeah, sure.” Jason shuffled over a bit and took a moment to really observe the Father as he sat down. His black cassock, whose color was so light (from being worn for a while, Jason assumed) it could be mistaken for a dark grey, was neat and tidy, and the white strip that encircled his collar called for reverence and respect. His salt-and-pepper hair was thinning and in the process of receding, and the crinkles on his face were just starting to become more defined. His skin was a mocha color, but his eyes were a dazzling Carolina blue as they peered at Jason over his spectacles.

            “You seemed deep in thought,” Father Rick noted, giving Jason a quick once over. “And those thoughts were troubling you.” It wasn’t a question but more of a statement, and Jason didn’t give a reply, just ducking his head and looking away, which wasn’t really the politest thing to do. “That’s what I supposed.” His voice was neither angry nor judgmental, and for a while the two just sat side-by-side in the pew of the small church that was probably the only one on this side of the city that was actually well-kept, though on the outside there was graffiti, which was useless when it came to removal since they’d just come back again) and wear-and-tear. Jason’s gaze wandered to the stained-glass windows, the things that vandals were either A) too reverent to break or B) too worried about the karma that would come with breaking them. They depicted the sacred mysteries, but what caught Jason’s eyes were the angels. They were always in the background, their hands clasped in prayer and their mouths open in song, and sometimes they framed the picture, their wings blazing gold as the fading sunlight passed through them.

            The sight made him too bitter and he averted his gaze, and the Father seemed to notice this.

            “I’m going to go out on a limb here and think that you don’t come here often,” he stated, and Jason’s jaw clenched as he nodded, though reluctantly. It was a bit awkward when you admitted to a priest that you weren’t really that rah-rah about Jesus or religion. When the Father spoke again, there was no irritation in his voice, which was filled with easygoingness that soothed Jason’s nerves, “Are you questioning your faith? Don’t feel embarrassed to admit it; a lot of people go through the same bumps in their road to eternal life.” Jason withheld a remark about how he was taking the elevator straight downstairs once he kicked the bucket.

            “No,” Jason said softly, and with a jolt he realized that’s really the first semi-private thing he’s relayed to a stranger. This felt different, though, because Father Rick was a priest. Priests could keep secrets, right? “I just think…” he paused, unsure of what to say, and the Father waited patiently for his response as he worried his bottom lip in between his teeth, “…that the man upstairs doesn’t like me.”

            “And why is that?” Father Rick asked, and Jason gazed around the church warily, though the only other person was an old lady that was sitting in a pew well out of earshot.

            “I’ve done some…pretty bad things, padre,” the blond admitted, knitting his fingers together and letting out a laugh that sounded all too bitter to his ears. He had to be emotionless. A closed book. Yet for some reason he was spilling his guts for a man he’d only known about for a few months and had only spoken to just now.

            “We’ve all done some bad things in our lives,” the Father soothed, and Jason flinched away when he tried to put a hand on his shoulder.

            “Yeah, but I can assure you that the things I’ve done are much worse,” Jason sighed. In a smaller voice, he whispered, “So much worse.”

            “Surely they can’t be that bad,” the Father assured him. “And besides, as long as you’re seeking and longing for forgiveness, the Lord will forgive you.”

            “These sins are mortal. They can’t be forgiven. I’m surprised there isn’t fire raining from the sky because I’m sitting in here right now.” Father Rick looked surprised, but his expression was still gentle.

            “Are you positive that they can’t be forgiven?” he questioned, sounding a bit dubious though not critical.

            “Pretty positive,” Jason replied. “And I keep doing it over and over again even though I _know_ it’s wrong, but I’m doing it for my family of two. Doing it for us so we don’t have to live in this shithole and we don’t have to scrounge for any money we can find. My…my sister hates me for it. She wasn’t supposed to know but she does, and she won’t even look me in the eye anymore.” Jason dragged his hands down his face, knowing that he was going to regret spewing his secrets and personal information later, and despite this he continued, “I don’t know how to fix it.”

            “I’m sure you’ll find a way, but I doubt you’re going to tell me what it is that you do.” The Father sighed when Jason shook his head vigorously, rising to his feet and bidding him farewell, though the blond didn’t reply as he buried his face into his hands and forced the tears back. He could feel the eyes of the angels in the stained glass glaring at him unfeelingly, and that only made it worse.

            He never went to the church again after that.

 

\----Ω----

 

Needless to say, Jason and Thalia had needed another source of money, since their jobs were solely aimed at paying off the debt that they were left. There was no available work that would be able to pay for food and replacements for their raggedy clothing, and the ones that did required a high school and/or college degree. Those were the things that Jason didn’t have, but what he did have was raw determination, as well as the willingness to do anything and everything to get back on their feet. Surprisingly, Jason had found his opportunity to a better life through a stranger that he’d met on the street two years ago.

            Even when he was fifteen he knew that talking to strangers wasn’t the best thing to do, especially in his neighborhood, where most of it was simply slums. Buildings were crumbling, the streets were riddled with cracks and potholes, and everything glass had been shattered from old age or by the local crime. No one could afford to fix them, so everything just kept withering and falling apart, and most of the places that people lived in would’ve been condemned long ago if the inspectors ever bothered to pay a visit. There were various frequenters that hung around the area that offered candy, the “candy” being crack, cocaine, meth, and devil’s weed, with a bit of heroin and marijuana thrown into the mix just to make it interesting. He knew that if you decided to sit down for a “beer” with them, you’d be as high as a kite when you finally stumbled away with flushed cheeks and bloodshot eyes.

            Predictably, one of these people, known to the locals as “Candymen”, approached him one summer morning, approximately a week and a half after Jason’s birthday. It was so hot and there was no air conditioning to be found, so the people retreated into their homes to dodge the heat. He was a rather buff guy, with thick, corded muscles and a wicked scar down his face whose origin was questionable, considering it looked like a claw mark from some sort of animal. His blond hair, which was a sandier blond than Jason’s, stuck up in some places, but overall was neat and tidy. His clothes weren’t too ragged, a huge contrast to Jason’s tattered jeans and faded T-shirt that he’d had since he was thirteen. Needless to say, Jason seen worse people on the streets than this guy.

            “Cigarette?” was the first thing he asked as he pulled out a pack of Marlboro and lit a joint, offering it to him. Even though a cigarette sounded really good to him, if he got addicted he’d have to worry about another expense.

“No thanks,” Jason told him, his anxiety flaring a bit when Luke’s expression didn’t change. There was a sparkle in his eyes that Jason really didn’t like, and he was a bit wary as he turned to walk away. That would’ve been that and there wouldn’t’ve been any fantastic story to tell, but the fact that a frighteningly large and callused hand fell onto his shoulder changed everything. Jason tensed up, for Candymen usually didn’t touch people they offered to unless they were super pissed off for some reason. If the victim wasn’t interested, they’d try a trick or two but would ultimately let them go if they stood their ground. “The name’s Luke.”

            “Hello, Luke,” Jason said in a tight voice. He really didn’t need to know this guy’s name, which probably wasn’t the one on his birth certificate…if he even _had_ a birth certificate. “I really need to be going-” Luke moved in front of him before he could leave, and that’s when his heart began to slam against his ribcage, his blood roaring in his ears. Jason swallowed the lump in his throat as Luke pulled the cigarette out of his mouth, exhaling a cloud of grey fumes that twisted and whorled in the air, and then flicking it away, grinding it against the ground with his shoe until it was snuffed out.

            Luke leaned in, his breath hot on Jason’s face. “Listen, kid. I know potential when I see it. You look like you could use a job.” He gestured to the teenager’s ragged grey shirt and mangled jeans. Jason was about to point out to Luke that his clothes were only slightly less tattered, but he kept his lips sealed. He didn’t want to fight with one of the Candymen. What if he was a part of one of the many local gangs? Jason would be minced meat if he took even one false step out of line around this guy. Slowly, he nodded. Luke gave him a crooked smile, revealing teeth that were surprisingly intact despite the fact that he probably got into at least three fistfights a day.

            “I’m not talking drug dealing, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Luke said in a low voice. “I’m talking angel hunting.” Jason regarded Luke for a moment, searching he face to see how high he was off of the drugs he sold, or how drunk he was. However his blue eyes were clear, shining with intelligence, and his face was far from flushed, pale even.

            “Um, I’ll pass. Err…sorry, but I really have to go-” he lied while slowly backing away from the crazy guy, hating how his voice quivered slightly with the fear. He didn’t think he could outrun this guy if he tried, and he certainly couldn’t take him on in a fight. Luke took a step forward and Jason backed up a little more, his eyes darting around to look for a possible opening from which he could make a valiant attempt at escape.

            “I’m serious,” he relplied, his voice now a growl. “And it wasn’t an offer, it was an order.” Jason had to cross his eyes to look down the barrel of the handgun Luke had just produced from his belt. “You’re coming with me.” The teenager gulped and put his hands behind his head, not making any sudden movements in case Luke’s finger slipped on the trigger and his brains were blasted out. He walked obediently down the street and felt the cold metal of the gun pressing in between his shoulder blades. He involuntarily shivered. What was he going to do? Thalia would be worried sick if he didn’t get home before dark. She’d be hysterical, knowing what kind of people lurked in the streets. What if Luke intended to kill him? All of these thoughts rattled inside Jason’s skull as Luke prodded him along.

            Absolutely nobody passed by, everyone holed inside of their sorry excuses for homes, and Jason felt sweat dribbling down his temple as the heat caused the air to ripple in front of him. The dirt underfoot was so dry that it was practically sand, and their feet sent clouds of dust billowing into the sky. Luke led Jason down an alley, looking around warily to see if anyone had followed. The cops here were horrible; they looked the other way when they saw things like these in action, probably because they purchased drugs off of the people committing the crime. Jason had finally figured this out when he saw them in their police cruiser smoking and laughing as a guy got mugged not ten yards away, the irritable scent of marijuana tinging the air around them.

            “Stay here and don’t move, or a bullet is gonna find a way through your skull,” Luke growled and turned to face the brick wall. Jason trembled against it, his hands shaking violently. Luke couldn’t have specifically wanted him. He had just been one of the unlucky ones that happened to be passing by; Luke would’ve probably done this to anyone, but it just had to be Jason that had been there at that moment. He cursed his luck, cursed the Heavens that had given him this luck, and blamed the angels and their stinking leader for thrusting him into this difficult life. Then again, some people had to shoulder all the bad stuff so others could get the good stuff, though that didn’t keep Jason from growing bitter.

            Luke ran his hand over the brick wall and Jason was sure that he was somehow intoxicated, even if he didn’t show any signs of it. He hadn’t staggered or stumbled and he could walk in a straight line. Could he just be plain crazy? There were a lot of mentally unstable people here, but he’d never seen one that acted so…sane, he supposed. Perhaps the screw loose in his brain didn’t affect the way he spoke or carried himself? Jason was highly doubtful as the other blond’s fingers skimmed over the coarse and crumbling blocks, mumbling numbers under his breath.

“Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty- got it!” Jason nearly jumped out of his skin as Luke turned to grin triumphantly, pressing on one of the bricks that seemed to be the same as all of the others. Jason felt his heart rate quickening even more, if that was even possible, and his hands shook as he heard a low beep sounding from the building to their right and one of the windows opened.

            “Climb the dumpster and get inside,” Luke demanded and nudged Jason with his gun for emphasis. He knew that there was the chance that the gun wasn’t loaded, that Luke was just bluffing, but he didn’t want to test his already crappy luck. Eying the layer of grime and wrinkling his nose at the ungodly stench, Jason clambered up the dumpster, making faces that seemed to amuse Luke to no end, and slipped through the window, which was surprisingly low to the ground. Luke followed with an easiness that showed that he’d done it more than once, his gun still trained on his hostage’s back, and closed the window behind him. The sound of a lock clicking into place made Jason gulp.

            It was fairly dim in the room that he and Luke had crawled into, almost as dim as it was dusty. Weak sunlight filtered through the windows that had excess grime and dust gathered on the panes, casting sickly yellow squares of light onto the bare floor. There wasn’t any furniture as far as Jason could see, and there wasn’t anyone else inside the building besides him and Luke. The silence within caused Jason’s ears to begin to ring, and had it not been a sweltering day he would’ve shivered at the eeriness. His captor marched him forward, growling for him to speed up or slow down with an ‘or else I’ll shoot’ after every order, and he would’ve laughed if he hadn’t been so utterly terrified. Jason’s heart was beating so loudly that he was afraid that Luke would hear it and take even more advantage over his fear, but if that was the case than the other man didn’t show it.

            They reached a very foreboding-looking door and the hinges squealed from the rust on its hinges as Luke opened it, gesturing towards the stairs that wound down to a lower floor. Jason let out a ragged breath and began his descent, with Luke not far behind. Their footsteps echoed through the deadly quiet building, fading away like dying screams. Jason’s ears rang and he tried to concentrate on anything except the incredibly hopeless situation that he was in right now. The walls were painted a bland, faded beige and in many areas the paint was chipped and cracked. Several bugs skittered by and electric lights hung here and there, emitting a faint and droning buzz as they brightened and dimmed.

            At the end of the stairs there was another door, which was just as noisy as the first, and the two of them filed inside after it was unlocked using a key Luke had produced from his pocket. This room, unlike the room that they had just been in, was illuminated by candles, though the only things that could be seen were the dancing flames and the things that were revealed in the small radius of light around them. Judging from the elevation of the lights, which were too high to be set down on the floor, they were on a table of some sort. Shuffling could be heard, as well as the scraping of chairs, as Luke escorted Jason towards the sound of hushed whispers. The faint outline of people could be seen, their eyes reflecting the light, however the forms were too distorted for Jason to really pick out their features.

            “Well what do we have here?” asked one of the indistinguishable people. The voice was clearly male and had a rather tantalizing and taunting tone to it, though it was on the reedy side. Jason could clearly picture the mischievous smile on the owner of the voice. “Looks like we got ourselves a newbie.”

            The hostage finally found his voice. With clenched fists he asked, “What am I doing here?” There was a chorus of chuckles, including one from Luke, and Jason heard the sound of someone’s chair scraping as they got up. He was terrified that the person would come over to him, but abruptly the electric lights blazed to life overhead, washing everything in a blinding white light that took a few moments for Jason’s eyes to adjust to. What met his eyes were five people, all who really didn’t look like the sort of people that Jason would trust on a daily basis. They were wearing all black, as if they were Goth rejects without the makeup, but surprisingly their clothes were intact, and leather. _If they have enough money to afford black leather jackets, what were they doing here in this mess of a town?_ Jason thought, bewilderment racing around his skull, along with a whirl of emotions and thoughts that made it difficult for him to concentrate on the present. That’s when his eyes drifted behind them, and he opened his mouth in a silent scream that never reached him lips.

            Behind the people was a glass case that stretched the length of the wall and rose to the ceiling. Jason couldn’t process what his eyes were seeing, and he rubbed them to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. Perhaps Luke had given something that he wasn’t aware of? Was a hallucinogen in the fumes from his cigarettes? He didn’t feel woozy in the slightest, his head a torrent of feelings and thoughts but still clear, but when he looked up again they were still there. Inside the case, glittering like two stars, was a set of wings. They were each twelve feet long and composed of thousands of downy white feathers, which altogether made a stunning image that artists would be scrambling to paint. That image was ruined, however, when Jason glanced at their bases, where they should’ve been fused to the flesh of some sort of humongous bird; they were clearly severed, and not in a nice and friendly way. The skin was rough and torn, as if they’d been ripped out of the bird’s back, and the feathers around the area were crusted with dried blood. Jason forged down the bile that was rising in his throat as he noted the circle of ragged flesh surrounding the gleaming white bone.

            They couldn’t be real, but the more Jason looked at them, the more genuine they seemed. You couldn’t duplicate this, and that flesh certainly looked like real flesh. Nobody would have the time to lay out all of the individual feathers on this, and some looked as if they’d been in the process of molting, with shafts poking out only partially as some clung to the wing by the force of sheer will. Each of them shimmered in the light, but Jason had a feeling that it would be much brighter and more beautiful if it was still attached. _But to what exactly?_ Jason asked himself.

            “I see that you’ve noticed our prize. Yes, these wings can fetch for over six thousand dollars, but we keep them because they are one of our biggest sets of wings,” one of the assembled people, a teenaged girl who looked about a year older, informed him in a tone that was rather matter-of-fact She had curly, honey blonde hair and calculating grey eyes that sparkled with cold, deadly intelligence, and they bored into Jason like he was a particularly interesting specimen that she wished to dissect. “Apparently you’re here because Luke here thought that you might be worth training.”

            “I don’t know what’s going on here.” Jason desperately tried to fight the quivering out of his voice, but to no prevail. The five people, now six due to the fact that Luke had joined them, chuckled amongst themselves as if they were old friends sharing an inside joke. Jason knew that he could make a break for it; the door was wide open and Luke wasn’t there behind him, but even so, all of the people in this room besides him were armed; Jason could see the glimmer of knives and daggers in their belts and all of them had holsters hanging by their hips.

            “Listen, you’ve been brought here for a reason. You have the potential to become an angel hunter. Like us,” the blonde girl told him.

            “So you mean that those wings are-” Jason was cut off by the voice that had greeted him earlier; the one that had sounded mischievous.

            “Angel wings,” he replied proudly. Jason turned to see that it had come from a rather scrawny boy. He looked funny in all black, along with all the weapons that he was carrying that altogether weighed heavier than him. He had curly brown hair and brown eyes that were filled with a rowdy and mischievous light. Jason knew it was probably best if he avoided him.

            “You kill angels?” he hissed. “Who would do that?” He sounded calm, but his insides were raging, trying to process all of the information that was being shoved towards him. His heart was raging, blood roaring in his ears as he clenched and unclenched his fists. Two sides were at war, the side that denied this existing and the side that was an enthusiastic believer. Both were tearing each other apart inside Jason’s head, a clatter inside of his skull that made his head pulse with pain.

            “Us,” was the boy’s snarky reply. “We need the money. Do you know how much a set of average-sized angel wings can go for?” Jason shook his head. “One. Thousand. Dollars.” He stiffened. One thousand dollars? He could use the money, for both him and Thalia. They wouldn’t be in poverty anymore. They could pay off their debt. They could by a mansion far away from here and live in the lap of luxury just in exchange for a few dozen sets of angel wings. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

            “Of course you have to go through a year’s worth of training before you can actually get to the hunting part. Angels are dangerous as well as beautiful, kid. But we want you to join us. We can be your family,” Luke told Jason, for the first time since they’d confronted each other his voice was gentle, though the blond still didn’t fully trust him. He didn’t trust anyone, except his sister, however he had to admit he was curious. The training sounded quite exciting, learning how to attack and defend against feathered foes that were must faster and stronger. He shook his head clear of the thought, thinking of how that’d earn him a first-class ticked down to the fiery pits, and he didn’t even really believe in heaven and hell until before then. Now he was doubting his actions because of some afterlife that he hadn’t even thought about since he still believed that there was some higher power watching over. He’d thought that there was nothing; that it was just him and Thalia and his wits and the debt, and it was just them against the world, with nobody keeping them safe but each other. Now he was rethinking that; if there were angels, there was a heaven and a hell and there were people who went to each when they died. Jason didn’t want to burn, but he wasn’t sure if he was ready for paradise, either.

            “I have a sister who needs me and I need her, too. I have loads of debt and two jobs and I can’t pile angel hunting on top of that,” he ground out through clenched teeth. “So I’ll pass. Plus, it’s immoral. I can’t just…” He shook his head and waved his hand, not wanting to say the terrible deed out loud.

            “It’ll just be a night job. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to,” the blonde girl told him. “But you’ll regret it, and the guilt wears off after a while.” Jason thought of all the opportunities of a good life slipping away if he denied, but the thought of the remorse that would come with it clashed for the prospect of middle-class life, wealth, even. Would he ever be happy if he didn’t become an angel hunter? Would he spend the rest of his days wishing that he’d taken the job? Or would he spend his days of angel hunting begging for forgiveness to the God that he hoped was listening. But he couldn’t really think about himself, though; he had to think of Thalia. What would be best for his older sister? What would make her life so much easier. There was really no contest after that. Jason looked up at the six people who were watching him expectantly.

            “I’ll do it.”


	2. Dreams of Seraphs

            Jason lay awake in his bed, and the thin, threadbare sheet that was draped over him offered absolutely no warmth whatsoever. He curled his toes as the cold nipped at his bare feet, and despite being all too familiar with the feeling, he tossed and turned, rubbing them together to try and warm them up. Thalia was in the bed opposite his, but she was facing the wall, her back to him. Her presence was comforting, the sound of her even breathing and the hypnotic rise and fall of her side were almost enough to put Jason to sleep. Almost. There was a problem, however, because even though Thalia was well into the dream world, tension hung thick in the air between them, a cold and ruthless wall erected to keep them apart, or, more importantly, keep Jason out. This wasn't a surprise to Jason, who took it in stride with a defeated acceptance to it; ever since his sister had learned about his job as an angel hunter, she’d turned cold.

 

_Her eyes went wide as she saw Jason hauling the two large wings inside. He’d thought she was working overtime, but he soon realized that she’d sacrificed the pay to celebrate Jason’s birthday. She had a newspaper-wrapped present and everything, even a beat-up cupcake from the local gas station mini-mart._

_“What have you become?!” she shrilled._

_“I’m doing this for us!” Jason bellowed in reply._

_“No, you’re doing it for you! You’re a monster, a sick, twisted beast-”_

            Jason dragged himself out of his memories as tears began to well up behind his eyes, and he furiously wiped them away with his arm. Thalia refused to even look at him these days, much less talk to him. When conversation was absolutely necessary she kept her words cold and clipped. Businesslike. It was if they were business partners discussing sales rather than siblings, and her venom-laced tone was like a knife to Jason’s chest, causing pain so severe that he would’ve preferred if she didn’t talk to him at all. Her voice was full of disappointment and regret, like she was angry at herself for not questioning the great deal of money they were wracking in. Jason didn’t have it in him to be bitter towards her. In fact, he was so resentful of himself that his self-hatred would’ve done just fine sending him on long guilt trips without Thalia’s disapproval. That just made it all the more worse.

            It was Saturday, and tomorrow was Jason’s day off from both angel hunting and his two other jobs. That night was one of the only nights he had the chance to relax and get a good night’s rest, maybe even sleep in a bit and sustain his teenage instinct to stay in bed until one in the afternoon, but he couldn’t get to sleep, no matter how hard he tried. He couldn’t help but remember his year of initiation, the year that the Golden Swords trained him for the field. It had been a difficult time, one full of grueling exercises and rote memorization of angel types and the best ways to kill those types, but it’d been all worth it in the end, even if he’d lost Thalia’s trust in the process. At least he was feeding them. Paying off their debt. Jason thought back to the hours upon hours of training, whether it be hand-to-hand combat or using weapons such as guns, knives, and swords. He was forced to train all night for six days a week, drilling moves and tactics over and over and over again. With his memories in mind, Jason finally managed to drift off into a fitful sleep. And just like that, he was thrown back in time.

 

\----Ω----

 

            _“I’m surprised you came back, newbie. I was betting that you’d chicken out. Angel hunting isn’t a walk in the park, you know,” Jason’s instructor, Leo Valdez, told his trainee. He had been the one with the mischievous smile and eyes that glittered with waywardness. It was Jason’s first day as an initiate for the organization, which he had learned was called the Golden Swords from Leo. He had yet to learn that Leo could fight like a demon if he needed to and could take Jason down in combat, despite the fact that he was a few inches shorter. Luckily he would serve mostly for the academic part of training, which Jason found boring to no end despite the fact that it’d saved him more than once or twice._

_“It’s good to be back, I guess,” Jason replied and looked around. Leo had taken him through a door that’d branched off the room with the white angel wings displayed in the glass case, which was the meeting room. Now the scrawny Latino boy was leading him down a long, narrow corridor. Electric lights that were dimming and flickering were set at ten foot intervals, giving the hallway that this-is-either-a-haunted-insane-asylum-or-a-jail-with-demons-in-it kind of look._

_Leo turned right at an intersection and stopped Jason in front of a heavily protected door. There were latches, padlocks, chains, finger scanners, and other securities that let everyone know that there was something important behind the door. Leo leaned in, his eyes dead serious, “Listen, Jason. If you walk in here and it’s all too much for you, then you’re not fit for this job. This is what angel hunting is all about.” Jason was bewildered for quite a few moments and watched in a mix of curiosity and confusion as Leo produced a ring of keys (and a rather large one, at that) from his nifty tool belt and unlocked all of the padlocks using all of them at least once. He’d memorized which keys were which, and Jason began to sweat. Would he have to memorize which keys fit into which locks? He hoped not. The final barrier was the finger scanner, and Leo pressed his index finger to the pad before the door clicked, signaling access to the room._

_Leo pushed the door open and Jason staggered slightly at the blinding light that reached his eyes, and he threw his arm up to shield himself as his eyes adjusted. Still half-blind, the blond staggered inside as Leo locked the door behind them, which he only later realized should’ve freaked him out; that would’ve been the exact time in the horror movie when the psychopath Latino serial killer in disguise cleaved his eyeballs out and sacrificed him to the angels on a stone pedestal. That thought, however, was not in Jason’s head at the moment, for he was too busy blinking the spots out of his eyes as the image came into focus. He couldn’t suppress a breathy gasp as he regarded the sight in front of him. It was a huge room, at least thirty feet long and twenty feet wide, but that wasn’t the thing that made it unique; mounted on the walls were dozens of pairs of angel wings. Jason was awed at the vast collection, but was also aware of the fact that this meant that dozens of angels were wandering the world without wings, unable to fly back to Heaven and most likely severely pissed and capable of tearing a human to shreds with their bare hands._

_The angel wings varied in size and color, like how no two people were exactly the same (if you ruled out twins). Jason saw a set of bright cerulean wings that were speckled with cobalt and lapis. Another set of wings was enormous, almost the size of the wings in the meeting room, and were the colors of a glorious sunset, streaked with reds, yellows, and maroons. There were all sorts of colors, ranging from classic white to dapple grey and even all the colors of the rainbow. There was one set of wings that sparkled so brightly Jason had to avert his eyes, and a navy pair that shined with galaxies in each feather._

_“This is...” he struggled to find the right word for it. He could describe it as morbid and ghastly, but there was also the beauty of the wings, and the sheer amount and variations of them gave Jason a bit of vertigo. “…amazing.” Leo gave a lopsided grin and gestured for him to follow. There were also glass cases that ran around the wall for wings that couldn’t be hung up, whether they were too large or there was simply not enough room. Similar glass cases lay in parallel rows across the space in between, each one holding their own special pair of severed angel limbs. Jason barely suppressed a shiver. Some had sides that were open, leaving Jason capable of running his hands, though hesitantly, over them._

_He had to admit that he was surprised at how soft and downy they were for things that could launch angels into the sky and carry them away in seconds. Jason didn’t want to dwell on where exactly these gorgeous trinkets came from, but naturally Leo had to bring it up. “Most of these angels put up quite a fight,” he told him as he gestured to all the wings around him. “In a few days the seven of us will wrap all of these in tarps, go to the Whisper and sell em’.”_

_“What’s the Whisper?” Jason asked. He had a feeling that it wasn’t anything good, considering that Leo spoke of it like it was a place they frequented on a daily basis. Anywhere that these guys hung around couldn’t possibly be kid-friendly, or person-friendly for that matter._

_“It’s like a pub, a strip club, and a nightclub all smashed together. It’s down one of the alleys on Seraph Road,” Leo replied, his voice filled with a cold humor that really set Jason on edge; he wasn’t sure if there was seriousness laced under the elfish boy’s words or if he was genuinely joking, and that was the first time that Jason became aware of the fact that Leo could be just as dangerous as Luke if he wanted to, despite their obvious differences. “It’s certainly not somewhere that you’d wish to go in alone. More Candymen in there than there are out on the streets. The air is filled with the smell of tobacco and there are bound to be encounters with drunkards. Prostitutes everywhere. And strippers, both male and female.”_

_“Why do you, we, go here again?” the initiate hissed. He knew that no decent man or woman would go to the Whisper, judging from Leo’s detailed description, and even though he was going to live a life that involved stripping angels of their wings, he didn’t want to hang out in the same place that involved people stripping off their clothes. Eventually he’d lose what civility he had left. Leo smirked a smirk that was filled with harsh coldness and malice, unlike his usually goofy grin. It sent chills up and down Jason’s spine._

_“Because it’s the hub of the black market. It’s not like we can sell these babies out in the open like people do with drugs around here,” he chuckled unsmilingly. “People flock to us like flies to honey. We’re paid handsomely, too. It’s a win-win-situation”_

 

            The memory changed.

 

            _“The angel’s only weakness is flight,” Luke told Jason and gestured to the dummy in front of them. It was larger and more muscular than most dummies, probably to represent the fact that angels were more powerful and harder to attack than a regular human. Two wings, which were represented by ripped fabric hanging off of two metal poles, were attached to the dummy’s back._

_“I thought that flight would be a strength,” Jason replied quizzically, regarding the replica with his cold blue eyes._

_“It is on some levels, but when it comes down to it, it’s more of a burden than a benefit. Angels depend too much on flying, and they know it. If you keep them from flying, they’re helpless. It’s difficult to keep them grounded, though; they know that most enemies concentrate on trying to keep them from flying rather than fighting. They simply fly away, choosing flight over fight,” Luke explained._

_“But if we have to keep them from flying, then we have to somehow damage their wings, and that will bring down the price they go for,” Jason pointed out, fairly bewildered._

_“There are other ways of keeping an angel down, you know. We have this.” Luke walked to the wall, which was covered with mounted weapons, and selected one of the larger ones. “This will definitely get them dropping. If shot with this while in the air, they’ll fall like stones.”_

_He aimed the weapon at the dummy and pulled the trigger. A loud bang sent Jason’s ears ringing, but that was nothing compared to his shock as a thick chain was launched at the poor manikin. On both ends were large, spherical weights that looked pretty heavy, and the chain wrapped around the dummy’s torso with enough force to send a pro wrestler staggering. If it hadn’t been bolted to the floor, it sure would have fallen over._

_"Sadly, angels are quick and agile in the air, and if they see it coming they’ll dodge it like nobody’s business. We don’t really use this weapon at all; even if we used it for surprise attacks, the loud bang will only alert them of our presence,” Luke explained, unwinding the chains and the weights and reloading the weapon._

_“Then what weapon do you use?” Jason questioned and turned to see Luke had returned the weapon to its place and had traded it for a handgun._

_“We shoot them,” he stated simply, smirking as he fired several shots at the dummy. Every single one found their mark. Jason gasped and clamped his hand over his mouth, causing Luke to chuckle, “They don’t die, idiot; they’re immortal. They can still feel pain, though, and they’ll spiral to the ground if you can get a few good shots to the body.” He turned to Jason, his blue eyes glittering. “Angels are nasty creatures, kid. Don’t let their pretty faces and wings fool you. Behind that soft appearance is a cold-blooded monstrosity. Trust me when I say they deserve to suffer.”_

\----Ω----

_"Okay, Jason. It’s your first hunt, but you’re still in training; we’re hunting as a group, but the rest of the time we all go our separate ways. The more people on the hunt, the more likely you are to alert the angel of your presence,” Luke announced. The seven members of the Golden Swords were gathered in the alley, shuffling nervously. No matter how many times they went hunting, it was still a process that caused their stomachs to do flip-flops. It was even more so for Jason, who’d only seen angels in pictures and had only practiced on dummies and his teammates, both who couldn’t fly like angels could. Fighting an actual angel would be a whole new experience, and a dangerous one at that._

_Jason had learned that, depending on the type of angel, they could destroy you in countless lovely ways. There were six types of angels; fallen angels, death angels, messenger angels, fire angels, guardian angels, and Archangels, all of which were super deadly. Jason remembered the words that Leo had told him at one of his lessons:_

\----Ω----

            “All of the angels I just listed can squash you like a bug, except for Archangels, though fallen angels aren’t a problem for us; they hate angels and some of them are our number one buyers when we sell wings at the Whisper.”

            “But I thought that Archangels were almighty,” Jason had asked, recalling the handul of years at Catholic school that his parents had forced him to attend. Oh how he wished S. Margaret could see him now. “Gabriel, Michael, Raphael, Uriel, Azrael; they’re like the head honchos. Aren’t they supposed to be all-powerful?”

            “They are. They can’t squash us like a bug because we don’t hunt them,” Leo had replied, his tone matter-of-fact and carrying a clear note of ‘Duh, obviously’. “Even then, only Azrael regularly descends from Heaven, since he’s the Angel of Death and all and his little death angel minions help him out, too.” His expression turned solemn. “There’s a rule that we can never, ever hunt Archangels if we ever encountered one. They’re too strong and too powerful; challenging one will only end in your destruction and a one-way ticket to Hell. Other angels can’t banish you to Hell, since that’s the Archangels’ decisions. We don’t hunt them; we hide and pray that they don’t find us.”

\----Ω----

            What if we accidentally attack an Archangel? What if there’s a flaw in the strategy and one of us ends up losing our life? _Jason thought and looked around at his comrades, which had indeed become like a second family. Of course Leo and Luke were among the mix, but there were others._

_The blonde girl that had reassured Jason when he had first met the Golden Swords was named Annabeth Chase. She was like the leader; a calm, collected braniac that could fight tooth and nail if it meant that she succeeded and kept her organization hush-hush. That’s a part of the reason why angel hunting was so risky; if the angel got away they could report the Golden Swords to the Archangels, but if they were able to hack their wings off, they couldn’t fly back. So far no angel got in a scuffle with a member of the Golden Swords and made it out with their wings, and Jason hoped that that wouldn’t change tonight._

_Luke, whose last name Jason had discovered was Castellan, was in charge of battle training and helped Annabeth create fighting tactics. He’d received his nasty scar when he tussled with a death angel and refused to give up until the angel’s grey wings were mounted on his wall, and they remained there to this day. Jason had no idea why there were no angels with black wings, for it seemed customary to think that all death angels had jet-black wings like bottomless pits. “In all my years of angel hunting I have never seen an angel with completely black wings. Sure, I’ve seen a death angel or two with black wings speckled with white or gold, but never an angel with feathers that were entirely black. Sure, maybe Azrael has black wings, but he’s an Archangel; an exception,” Luke had told him, grinning and clapping him on the back as he said this. He was excellent with a sword and probably the most skilled and gifted fighter out of all of the Golden Swords._

_But the second in command was a poker-faced girl named Reyna Avila Ramirez-Arellano. She and Jason had become very close during his time of training and she’d even take up the job as his trainer when Luke was out angel hunting or had fallen ill. Her fighting was like a deadly dance, though the one who fumbled their footing would likely be the one to wind up at the end of the sword. It had been mostly Jason who found himself going cross-eyed to see the blade leveled in front of him. Even so, Jason trusted Reyna with his life, and was glad that she’d come along, though it wasn't like she had much of a choice. Jason liked to think it was because she wanted to cheer him on and not because Annabeth had given anyone who tried to object her super-scary death glare._

_Leo Valdez was the one who was good with tools, and while Annabeth was book smart about mortal things, Leo was the one who was the whiz on angels and everything there was to know about them. It was why he’d been Jason’s “academic” teacher, if you considered academics identifying the best place to sever an angel’s wings from their bodies while they were still alive. Leo made all the weapons, the traps, and even the glass cases that were custom-made for every set of wings brought in. He could usually be found in the huge forge connected to the Golden Swords’ facility, which he’d named Bunker 9 (even though the other eight bunkers were nonexistent), and he rarely came out at all. Reyna had mockingly claimed that he was more skilled with communicating with machines than living things._

_He was rusty when it came to fighting, but he played his part in the hunt by setting the traps beforehand; the most common style of angle hunting was waiting until one of the traps had been sprung and them ambushing. How did Leo lure the angels in? With demon parts, which were also sold on the black market. All angels were born to hunt demons, and if there was any sign of a demon lurking around they would check it out. Leo bought demon hair and scales, sometimes even demon feces; anything that a demon would naturally leave behind._

_A trap would be set around it and once the angel was in close enough range, they were goners, usually ending up hog-tied with iron ropes or caught in nets. Leo also had come out with a model similar to a bear trap, but Luke had discontinued it, for it left the angel with a mangled ankle or even a severed foot. “We don’t want the angels to suffer, we just want its wings. Injuring one to the point that it is both physically and mentally suffering is the lowest of crimes, even for us,” he had said with an icy tone, and Jason could only agree with the statement._

_The last two members of the team were Gwendolyn and Dakota. They refused to give their last names, claiming that if any other member of the Golden Swords were ever captured by angels and tortured, they wouldn’t be able to give them exact names. Jason would’ve dubbed them paranoid, but he could see where they were coming from. He had no idea what their strengths and backgrounds were, for he rarely hung out with them, preferring to spend time with Leo, Reyna, and Luke. Annabeth rarely left the facility and was a huge bore, not to mention a total downer._

_The one time he had hung out with Dakota and Gwen, he was told the story of a former member of the Golden Swords. “Octavian,” Dakota said in a spooky and slurred voice, as if he were a pre-teen telling a scary story at the campfire…if pre-teens became severely intoxicated. He was a lover of all things alcohol, but kept his intake in check mostly because Annabeth would have his hide if he didn’t. Jason was pretty sure that his alcohol consumption was part of the reason he had to hunt angels in the first place. “One day he jus’ disappeared wi’out a trace. Annabeth thinks he jus’ quit ‘is life of angel hunting an’ wen’ back to ‘is family wi’ the money, but I think he wa s’out huntin’ and confronted an Archangel. He wa s’never keen on findin’ one angel type from ‘nother, so he probably ‘tacked it. No wonder why he wa s’never heard from again.”_

_The thought of encountering an Archangel absolutely terrified Jason. He shivered despite the fact that it wasn’t that cold, and worried his bottom lip in between his teeth as he tried to shove all of his thoughts to the side. Instead, he checked to make sure he had all of his weapons and reviewed the plan over and over in his head, along with the backup plans, and the backup plans for the backup plans. Luke had assured him that there had never been any need to use the backup plans; their tactics were foolproof._

_“Is everyone ready?” Annabeth asked, her tone formal. Everyone nodded vigorously, eager to get on with the hunt. “You too, newbie?” she said, regarding Jason._

_“Yes, ma’am!” the trainee replied, his voice tinged with a note of worry._

_“Don’t worry, you won’t get hurt. I promise,” Leo assured him with a pat on the back. Jason just wrung his hands and nodded tersely. His first hunt. He’d see his first angel tonight. He wasn’t sure if he was excited with the thrill of the hunt, terrified that they’d attack an Archangel, or horrified that he was even participating in such an event. Maybe it was even a combination of all three. Butterflies fluttered in his stomach and his heart was racing in his chest, but a wave of calm shot through all the nervousness and the worry. A battle calm that Luke had always described when he recalled his hunting escapades. Jason relaxed and set his jaw, determined to prove that he had what it took to be an angel hunter._

_That’s when a device in Leo’s belt began to beep. “The alarm,” Leo announced, sounding way too excited for a person about to commit a mortal sin. He, along with the rest of the Golden Swords, had been waiting in dead silence for one of the traps that they’d set up around town to be sprung, their faces grim and emotionless. “It’s the trap in the alley on King Street.”_

_“Let’s go. Masks on,” Reyna ordered and everyone obliged, pulling their masquerade masks over their faces. They were made of pure gold and each member’s mask was shaped like a different animal. Reyna’s was shaped like a swan with outstretched wings to act as the parts that covered her eyes, which glittered through the small holes carved into the metal. Annabeth’s was very beautiful, each feather detailed to perfection and mimicking the facial disk of an owl. Her grey eyes watched Jason critically and he could almost see them being the owl’s actual eyes. They were full of wisdom and disguised a lethal and deadly skill, hidden behind beauty and a faux look of fragility. Leo’s was in the shape of a donkey, probably the least majestic of all of the masks, but Jason had to admit that it suited him well; he could be a real ass at times. He grinned and Jason was glad that the mask only covered his eyes and nose; if it was a full mask it would’ve looked as creepy as hell in the dark. Dakota’s masquerade mask was in the shape of a leopard with fangs poking out from under the upper lip. Of course, since it was a masquerade mask like everyone else’s, there was no jaw. Dakota’s eyes were rather unfocused, signaling that he’d had a little too much to drink the night before, even though Annabeth and Reyna had specifically ordered him to lay off the alcohol in order to make sure that the hunt was successful. Gwen’s mask was just a simple masquerade mask that was not in the shape of an animal. Jason had learned from the little time he had associated with her that she was a person that valued simplicity, and she did not want Annabeth to spend too much money on her gold mask, despite the fact that the leader was rich off the money that angel wings fetched for. Last but not least, Jason’s mask was in the shape of an eagle. The eagle’s beak, like that of his other comrades’ bird masks, went down the bridge of his nose and hooked around the apex. When he had first gotten it he had been awestruck. This had been for him. He was officially a part of the team. Luke had watched smugly as he stared at it in wonder. He had never owned something so expensive or beautiful before._

_If the angels escaped, they wouldn’t be able to describe any facial features or even hair color, for the Golden Swords had all pulled their hoods over their heads. In the dark it would make it even harder for the angel to describe them._

_“Let’s move out,” Annabeth ordered and the Golden Swords stalked out of the alley, looking around warily. If any of the locals saw them, they would’ve assumed that they were one of the many street gangs that wandered the streets in search of their next victim. Jason was aware of all of his arsenal bumping against his thighs. His gun was safely tucked away in its holster and his knives were all in sheathes. He was prepared for anything and everything the angel might throw at him; his clothes, jacket, boots, and masquerade mask were fireproof to protect from fire angels’ flames. The soles of his boots were enchanted to prevent death angels from making the earth swallow him up, which was one of their more horrifying abilities._

_The lamps that were actually working cast dim circles on the ground, illuminating the cracked sidewalk and faded street with a hazy yellow glow. The Golden Swords slipped in and out of the shadows in coordinated unison, using their training to make sure their feet did not make a sound as they walked. Annabeth flattened herself against the wall of a building and everyone followed her lead. She peered around the corner, some of the lamplight reflecting off the gold of her mask and causing it to shimmer. She made a motion that it was all clear and they slunk down King Street, their movements graceful and catlike._

_Jason’s heart beat like a drum and the blood was roaring in his ears. The angel was nearby if Leo’s device was correct. That wasn’t what he was scared of, though. Even though the wings in the trophy room were pretty to look at, he had never really seen the process that they needed to go through to acquire them. He braced himself for what was coming, because he knew that angels looked human. That they felt pain like humans. That they could feel emotion like humans. They were like elephants being hunted for ivory, except they had to suffer while their immortality prevented death and healed the wounds._

_That’s when he began hearing the sound of struggle. A grunt, a hiss of distaste, a frustrated growl, a curse in a foreign language that certainly didn’t sound native to Earth. Annabeth put a finger to her lips and crept towards the alley which the noise was coming from. Jason was so nervous and excited that he nearly tripped over the curb, but Luke steadied him and gave him a look that clearly stated:_ I know how you feel. _He was grateful for his support, but was more focused on the fact that his heart had relocated to his throat as Annabeth crept around the corner, a grin breaking out across her face._

_“We caught ourselves a winner,” she called softly over her shoulder and poised herself, striding into the alley with her head held high. The rest drifted behind her like shadows, hesitant but eager to see the prize. Gwen, Dakota, Luke, and Leo parted so Jason could get a good view. He sucked in a breath. The angel was beautiful._

_His jet-black hair was plastered to his forehead and neck with sweat and his eyes, which were the color of dark chocolate, darted scanned them all one by one. They locked with Jason’s and the teenager willed himself to hold his gaze steadily, when in reality he was almost as scared as the angel was. In the end it was the captured creature that looked away. His chest was bare, revealing chiseled abdominal muscles and deep, defined biceps. His shoulders were broad and his features like that of a god, but the image was ruined as Jason saw the raw fear and terror in his eyes._

_The angel was wearing torn black jeans and his skin was pale to the point of chalkiness. You could see his panicked breathing by the way his sides heaved and by the gasping, panting breaths he managed to take. That’s when Jason saw them; two huge wings the color of a stormy sky were folded behind his back, quivering with fear. He looked so human that Jason couldn’t even imagine him harming a fly._

_The poor thing had been forced to his knees as a heavy metal net draped over him with ropes like the cables on bridges, weighing him down. He was noticeably straining to stay upright and not collapse onto his side, his muscles bulging as he kept himself from keeling over. Jason knew that angels’ strength was not infinite and that they did have their limits, but he couldn’t help but expect him to shoulder the net off like it weighed nothing and launch himself at them. The angel, on the other hand, remained motionless as Annabeth approached him._

_“Death angel. Wings are about five feet each. We’d get about three thousand for the both of them,” she stated, her voice ringing through the night and echoing down the streets. Even though her voice was low, in the silence of the night it was as if she’d shouted, and the angel froze, his eyes widening._

_“W-w-what do you mean?” he asked, his voice quivering. “I know you’re probably a local gang or something but can you get me out? Please?”_

He even talks like a human. I thought he’d be more formal and say stuff like ‘thou’ and ‘thine’ but he doesn’t, _Jason thought, filling with dread. How could he possibly watch this angel’s wings be chopped off?_

_When they didn’t answer him, the angel began to tremble, shaking the metal coils that trapped him slightly. “I don’t know what’s going on,” he whimpered, his voice pleading. “But I need to get out. I need to get home.”_

Block out his voice, Jason. He’s not human, he’s a creature. He can live without his wings. He’s immortal; he’ll live forever without having to worry about death. After a few hundred years he won’t even miss them, _Jason chanted over and over in his mind, a litany of words that he was trying to convince himself of, but he knew that he didn’t sound persuasive, even to himself._

_“Hermes? Bacchus?” Annabeth asked. She was using the code names that she had given them. She was Athena, Gwen was Ceres, Leo was Hephaestus, and Jason was Jupiter. Bacchus and Hermes were Dakota and Luke’s code names. The two boys advanced and the angel struggled feebly in the net, trying to get out. The feathers on his wings were getting crumpled and Jason cringed at the sight of such beautiful things being ruined._

_They grabbed the angel’s wings and forced them out of the gaps in the nets that were large enough for angel wings but too small for both humans and angels alike to squeeze through. The angel cried out and clawed at them, his nails catching on Luke’s cheek, more like a frightened animal trying to defend itself than a fierce creature out for blood. He hissed through gritted teeth as three thin lines of blood trickles out of the shallow marks, and Jason found himself too terrified to look away as the scene unfolded before him._

_“What is your name?” Annabeth asked, her voice so cold that it was surprising, even if she was surly most of the time._

_“I am known as The Bringer of Bereavement,” the angel spat, his voice filled with aggression. What was left of his scared, skittish self was gone. He bared his teeth and flapped his powerful wings, almost making Dakota and Luke lose their hold on them._

_“No, your real name,” Annabeth corrected, her eyes glittering like cold grey stars._

_“Then call me Nicolas. My True Name cannot be spoken by you puny mortals,” the angel, Nicolas, growled. “I didn’t think you humans were worth much in the first place, but you must be even lesser than them. Lesser than the dogs that scrounge for scraps in the trash, or else you wouldn’t be doing this in the first place.” Anger towards the angel that Jason didn’t know he had in him surged through the trainee’s veins. His hands balled into fists at his sides and he so desperately wanted to nail the conceited angel in the face; he was doing this for his family of two. It was battered, it was broken, but it was still his family, and he had to get his family out of debt. How dare the angel try to understand something that was so clearly none of his business? He forced himself stayed behind Annabeth with Gwen and Leo. He shouldn’t move unless ordered to; it was best for his safety and the safety of the rest of the Golden Swords._

_“Alright, Nicolas…can I call you Nico?” Annabeth mocked, her voice merciless to the point where Jason was taken aback. He had never heard his leader talk in such a tone. “Nico, you have something that we want.”_

_“And what might that be?” Nico snarled. “Because you’re certainly not getting it. I can banish you to Hell with a snap of my fingers. You’re playing with fire, my friends.”_

_“No, you cannot, for you aren’t an Archangel, but merely a lowly death angel. Your ranks will not miss you.” Nico visibly paled as Annabeth said this; she had called his bluff and now he was aware of just how much they knew about his kind._

_“What do you mean?” the angel’s voice had turned gravelly, probably to hide the fear and astonishment in his voice. Annabeth gave Luke and Dakota a pointed look and they wrestled the angel’s wings so that they were pinned to the ground. Luke stood and with one foot keeping the wing down he kicked the writhing angel so that he was on his stomach. The metal cords of the net prevented him from rising again and he cursed his captors and thrashed like nobody’s business._

_“Jason, since this is your first hunt I’d like you to do the honors,” Annabeth told him with icy diction. Jason paled and his hands began to tremble, blood roaring in his ears as his heart hammered against his ribcage. All the fury from before had left him and he was now afraid of all the mortal sins that would pile on his shoulders as he kept walking down this path. He would go to Hell for sure, but there was always the option to back out; leave and never come back. But that would mean that his and Thalia’s debt would pile higher and higher and they’d be left homeless and hungry. Even though his sister now hated him, he still cared about her with all his heart. On top of that, he would’ve been letting the Golden Swords down; they were his team, his friends, and his family. They’d seen potential in him and had taken him under their wing. Abandoning them would mean throwing away all of the good memories they’d shared. Jason couldn’t bring himself to do that._

_Annabeth handed him her sword, which looked like a long, sharpened bone, as he stepped forward, and he took it with quivering fingers. Inside, he was screaming. Voices warred within his mind, the metaphorical angel and demon on his shoulders tearing each other to shreds as they fought for dominance. He wasn't sure which one had won, but resolve thickened within his mind as he maintained a white-knuckled hilt on the double-edged, yet surprisingly light, sword’s hilt. He approached the angel, who was slumped on the ground, exhausted from thrashing and when he looked up, his eyes growing impossibly wider when he saw the sword._

_Jason chewed on his bottom lip, a bead of sweat trickling down his forehead as he continued to advanced, step by painstaking step. Nico seemed to put two and two together and struggled feebly, and Jason could almost sense the fear pulsing off of him. “Please. Don’t,” he begged, his voice but a raspy whisper. “If you let me go and keep my wings I won’t tell a single soul. I swear it on my immortality. Please.” A tear slipped down his cheek as the last drop of his energy drained from him. Jason felt fissures spreading along the barrier he’d erected to keep the guilt out, and bits and pieces seeped out, beginning to torment him as they whispered of all the terrible karma he was going to receive if he did this. He was surprised that the thing held, and no matter how hard he tried to steel himself against the creature, the wall kept crumbling. He knew he had to do this, and fast, before it disintegrated completely._

_Jason hesitated, looking to Luke for guidance, and his instructor gave a short nod of encouragement. The night sky spread over head like the black pelt of a bear, and the stars twinkled down accusingly, like angry Archangels. He thought of what Nico would see in the stars after his wings were severed from his body. Would he see home? Would he see friends? Family? But the feeling would be mutual; agonizing homesickness and sorrow. He wouldn’t be able to return to the place he loved; he’d still keep his powers, but he would forever be anchored to the horrible, sin-ridden earth that was no place for an angel._

_Jason quickly blocked out those thoughts and stopped right in front of the trembling angel, and he saw the muscles on Nico’s back tense as he prepared for the worst._ This is for the Thalia. _Jason told himself as he raised the sword over his head._ For Thalia. _Nico let out a broken sob and screwed his eyes shut tight, shielding his head with his hands._ For Thalia. _Two thrusts of the razor-sharp blade and the wings were severed, such a short procedure for something so earth-shattering. Nico screamed at the top of his lungs and broke down into wails of sorrow and agony, and the others moved in and pulled the net from the crumbled form of the angel. Jason had tried to make it as clean-cut as possible, but there was still the slightest hint of stumps protruding from Nico’s back._

_Jason raised the wings up, feeling how surprisingly light they were compared to their size. Blood was everywhere; it dripped down from the detached wings and soaked into his hood. It came forth in rivers from the horrible wounds that marred Nico’s back. His comrades cheered, but Jason didn’t feel proud. He felt sickly and tainted. He had just mercilessly chopped off an angel’s wings._

_The Golden swords lifted him onto their shoulders, still carrying the steadily bleeding wings, and marched him back to the facility. He wasn’t concentrated on their congratulations and cheering, though; all he was aware of was the horrible wails of Nico as they left him bleeding in the alley, which eventually bubbled into quiet sobbing._

\----Ω----

 

            Jason woke up with a jolt and a blood-curdling scream escaped his throat, the sound of Nico’s cries of pain and suffering still ringing in his ears.


	3. Head in the Clouds

            For Perseus, being an angel wasn’t what it was cut out to be, contrary to popular belief. As a messenger angel, he had to go back and forth across Heaven and Earth and back again until his wings were sore and felt like they were going to fall off. It was a little dizzying at times and there were a multitude of occasions when he nearly got hit by planes because he was too discombobulated to concentrate. Of course, the scrolls he’d had for the sentries stationed in the mortal world, their jobs to keep an eye out for demonic activity, were very important, and Perseus didn’t think getting hit by a flying metal cylinder at five hundred fifty miles per hour would be beneficial to them getting orders and information from Heaven. They were already disconnected as it is. Perseus had heard whispers, had heard the tales people told behind his back when they thought he wasn't around to hear, and most of them accused the messenger angel of being too stuck in his fantasy world, rendering him unfit to be the messenger for Archangel Michael himself.

            Perseus managed to ignore the gossip most of the time, having endured rumors about him since he was a mere fledgling, but today he was in a particularly sour mood. He’d snapped at two fire angels who’d been calling him inexperienced and had stared two fledglings down until they were in tears when they’d pointed at his wings and began to blab on to their parents. Nobody could blame him for his downright foul mood, because yet another angel had gone missing from Heaven’s ranks, and this time they’d been one of his closest companions. He and Nicolas had been friends since conception, really, with Perseus’ mother, Sally, and Nico’s mother, Maria, having been incredibly close friends. Their fathers butted heads quite a lot, but Poseidon and Hades could’ve been mistaken for brothers, their bond went that deep. The thought of his parents made him homesick, but they lived far away and he had so much work that he could never find the time to visit. They understood, though, and Perseus reminded himself to write a scroll to them later.

           There were two sides to that problem that made Perseus downright livid. One, of course, was the fact that his blood brother was missing, but the other was that the situation had prompted the Archangels to become very chatty, and do you know what that means? More work for Perseus. Yay. What Perseus could glean from the whole thing was that Archangels had growing suspicions, considering they were sending messages back and forth across Heaven like bullets, and were trying to find a way to solve the problem without putting anyone at risk. Their rapid communication was leaving Perseus barely enough time to bring the message before he was sent back with another.

            After the messenger angel’s fiftieth trip across the cloudy plain, he had to stop for a break, lest he pass out mid-flight from exhaustion. Thankfully, the capital of Shamayim had been close by, and he collapsed onto the roof of the closest building he could find, uncaring of the bite of the shingles into his body. He let out a soft groan, his sides heaving, and massaged his jet-black wings, which were screaming with fatigue. Nevertheless, Perseus could trust and rely on them more than he could with most of the angels in Heaven, who were unpredictable. His wings’ effort was an unyielding force that would never fail him, and Perseus couldn’t deny that they were the best wings he could have ever asked for. Even if they brought him much misery as a fledgling, what with the sidelong stares and the whispers that were kept from him, they could carry Perseus for long distances without tiring.

            Though the wings did have their limits, he didn’t know what life would be like without them. How did humans stay rooted to the ground when the air was where the fun is? How did they walk everywhere until their feet burned and their legs cried out for rest? All of these questions remained unanswered to Perseus, but he couldn’t decipher them now; he had a message to deliver back to Archangel Michael from Archangel Gabriel. He couldn’t dawdle, since a matter of great importance was afoot, but just lying on this roof forever seemed like a really good idea.

            “Hey, you!” Persues turned to see a very livid-looking fire angel standing outside the door, looking up at him. “Get off my roof!”

            “Sorry!” he cried, putting his hands up in the air with surrender, though there was a shit-eating grin on his face. The angel’s eyes widened when he saw Gabriel’s seal glittering the sun, and he bowed quickly before hustling inside. Perseus wasn't a dipshit, though, and he decided to respect the man’s wishes and scram. He did have places to be, after all.

            With a dramatic sigh and a groan as he contemplated the terrible distance he had to fly, he launched himself into the sky, ignoring his wings’ protests and relishing the feel of the wind whipping his black hair and beating against his face. With a whoop of delight he shot off faster than a bolt of lightning, making even the fastest of jet fighters make a run for their money, and the angel let out another cry of delight as he did loop-de-loops and barrel rolls until he was so discombobulated he could barely fly in a straight line. Perseus knew that there was a mortal law that you shouldn’t drink and operate an automobile. In Heaven, it was against the law to drink, let alone drink and fly. He felt like he’d downed a few shots and he felt light-headed, but it wasn’t from the high altitude, either.

            Mortals would suffocate up here, but angels had adapted to it, on top of the fact that they were immortal. It used to feel like they were deprived of oxygen all the time, but their lungs eventually accustomed to it. He flew for a while, his joy ebbing as his entire body wailed for rest or some form of break. At least he wouldn’t have to get worried about becoming fat anytime soon, with all the blue junk food that he consumed, but he’d been working for Michael since before humans were even a twinkle in God’s eye, so he technically had been banned from becoming obese even prior to the word ‘obese’ being invented. Finally, after several hours and almost three cases where he nearly fell out of the sky like a shot duck on that Nintendo game, he was finally beginning to recognize the scenery. He nearly cried with relief when, through the clouds, the palace of Archangel Michael loomed like a giant wall, making mortal structures seem like children’s toys. Perseus raised the hand with the scroll clenched inside of it and the guards, which were most likely fire angels or death angels, opened the gates for him to enter.

            He could see them gawking at his jet-black wings, for they were obviously newbies that had no idea that Perseus would flay them alive if they were caught staring, so he let it slide, but only this time. The other servants would probably tell them the rules once they let their mouths wag about Perseus’, well, existence. It was a shocker that they didn’t know he worked here, or maybe they were just star-struck (he couldn’t help but preen at that thought), because he was the only angel in kingdom of Heaven that had fully black wings. Maybe his fledglings would inherit his wing color, or his children’s children, but he hadn’t met any mate, male or female, that suited him quite yet, even after millennia. Of course, it was forbidden for angels to fall in love with mortals, but many of Percy’s comrades had been stripped of their wings and cast from Heaven due to their lust for humans.

            Perseus landed gracefully and folded his wings, which were eager for rest, behind his back. He braced himself to receive another message and sent back to Archangel Gabriel, but even the thought of another lap around Heaven, which was pretty huge, mind you, made him groan. He looked at the scroll in his hand, which was tied with a red ribbon. Curiosity and temptation urged him to read the message written on the parchment, but Perseus swatted the thoughts away. It was forbidden for messenger angels to read the messages that they were delivering, especially those from Archangels. Doing so would eventually result in falling from Heaven, which sounded pretty painful.

            But Perseus had to admit that he _did_ want to ask, but he abstained from it; it would be the ultimate form of rudeness. He knew that they were most likely discussing the disappearance of Nicolas, for Archangel Azrael had requested help that his angel be found. Most would think that there were too many angels for the Archangels to know every single one, but their memories were infinite. They knew every single angel that lived in Heaven, and cared for them all equally. Archangel Azrael had clearly been in distress, for Archangel Michael had bitten his lip when he had read it. It was unlike Archangel Azrael, the king of all the death angels, to become panicked, but he was caring for all of his workers, and when one went missing he threw a fit.

            But seriously, what if the whole conversation was just like:

 

            _Sup Gabe, how’s it going? -M_

 

_Nothing much Mikey –G_

 

_Will u help me look 4 this Nicolas guy? –M_

 

_Sure. #heismissing #JUSTDOINGMANLYANGELTHINGS -G_

 

_Lol. Azrael will kick ur ass if he hears dat. –M_

 

_#dealwithit –G_

 

_Search party tomorrow. Will u show? –M_

 

_Probs. –G_

 

_Gonna b dangerous. –M_

 

_#YOLO –G_

 

_What is it with u and mortal #’s? And it’s YOLF: You only live forever. –M_

 

_Whatevs. Dunno why I’m using them. Just sounds cool. –G_

 

_Can u tell r bros Raphael & Uriel? They need 2 know. –M_

 

_I ain’t getting my ass of dis couch. Do it urself or make ur messenger angel do it. –G_

 

_Jfc im head Archangel and I command you to tell the homies. And dude ur like the head messenger angel I hav no idea y we r making my messenger angel do dis. –M_

 

_-_- STFU -G_

 

_:D Lol. C you @ 8:00 –M_

 

_K (P.S Ur messenger angel is gonna b pissed when he finds out dis is why we r sending him back & forth) -G_

 

IF _he finds out. Haha. KK bye. -M_

 

            The thought of that made Perseus’ blood boil. He refused to adopt human culture of any sort, as did most angels who were used to being traditional. The Archangels were the only ones to seem to slightly embrace mortal customs, which Perseus found irritating since they were the ones who were supposed to be setting examples for Heaven. As the huge golden doors that towered overhead opened, Perseus couldn’t help but feel nervous around Archangel Michael; his power was only dwarfed by that of God Himself and the angel’s knowledge was nearly infinite. When you work for a guy who can banish you to the depths of Hell with a snap of his fingers, you have the right to get a little antsy around them.

            The doors closed behind the messenger angel with a dull thud as he began to walk, considering that flying within homes (or palaces, for that matter) was considered rude, down the long red carpet, trimmed with gold. The place was plenty big to fly in though, so large that it actually gave Perseus vertigo as he gazed around. Even after millennia, the Victorian feel of Michael’s palace never failed to astound him. Technically he lived here, too, along with the servants, but this was where the magic happened, where Michael oversaw Heaven and its functions. The grand hall that opened into the throne room was stunning, the interior being an exact replica of the Notre Dame de Lyon cathedral, minus the pews. Two fountains on either side of the room depicted stone angels holding jugs, and Holy Water poured forth out of them. Incense was burning somewhere and Perseus could hear the faint sound of a choir in the background, despite the fact that he was pretty sure the place didn’t have a choir.

            But angels weren’t just apart of Christianity, though. The linoleum was patterned with interlocking Stars of David, and there was a Torah outspread neatly on a marble altar, off to the side with a copy of the Bible and the Qur'an. The stained glass windows depicted scenes from important events in Muslim religion, with bits and pieces from the Old Testament and the Sacred Mysteries. The carpet ended at the base of a marble throne, embellished with golden leaves and animals, and perched on that throne was Archangel Michael himself. On normal days he would be lounging on it, tranquil and relaxed, but today he was poised at the edge of the seat has he waited anxiously for his messenger angel to return. When he saw Perseus his eyes lit up and he raced over, urgency woven through every fiber of his movement.

            The messenger angel knelt and presented the Archangel Michael with the scroll from Archangel Gabriel.

            “Thank you,” he breathed and opened the scroll, reading it over carefully but quickly. Perseus couldn’t help but marvel at the Archangels’ beauty. Originally, Lucifer had been that most beautiful angel, God’s finest creation, but since he turned corrupted and fell from Heaven, Michael had taken his place, considering he was the second eldest of all the other Archangels. Azrael didn’t really count, since he had better things to do than run Heaven, such as making sure that all the expired human souls went to the places they belonged, whether it be the Pit or Paradise.

            His honey blond hair curled around his ears, and his looks were equally masculine handsome as they were feminine beautiful. His eyes were a brilliant azure, the color of the sky and just as vibrant as they shimmered from the light that the stained glass windows cast on them. He was wearing silver armor and a red cape drifted around his wings, which were the biggest wings Perseus had ever seen to this day. They were as large as a bus was long, so big that they dragged behind him when he walked, but they still managed to seem proportional to the Archangel’s body. Sure, Perseus loved his wings despite the hardships he’d faced because of them, but he couldn’t help the twinge of jealousy low in his gut as he regarded the Archangel’s feathers, which were pure white and shimmered gold in the sunlight, dazzling him with every shift and flutter.

            Michael’s face, however, was grave as he read yet another one of Gabriel’s reply letters. The messenger didn’t like to see the furrow in his brow, the lines in his normally ageless face that made him look several years older. The moment passed, and he looked up at Perseus and with a grin on his face. You could consider them friends, Archangel Michael and messenger angel Perseus, since they’d been working together before humans were even a twinkle in God’s eye, and their bond ran deeper than most. They were companionable when they could manage to find the time, and considering Perseus had no other friends aside from the Archangel and a handful of his servants, which was a feat considering next to none of the angels in Heaven have ever talked to Michael, much less befriended him.

            “They found him,” he told Perseus lowly and rolled the scroll back up. With a flick of his wrist it disappeared into golden sparks. Perseus would’ve sighed in relief, except the look on Michael’s face told him that this announcement wasn't a good one. His stomach sank; what if they’d found him dead, killed by demons or rogue angels? What if _he’d_ gone rogue? What if Uriel was stripping him of his wings and casting him out of Heaven as they spoke? Perseus couldn’t help the nervous fluttering of his wings, and he was pretty sure his scent was radiating _nervous._

            “What is it, sir? Is something wrong?” Perseus asked, and he managed to fight off the waver in his voice. Archangels barely showed their emotions when it came to handling hard situations, but Perseus could clearly see the worry lines etched into Archangel Michael’s face, which was very uncharacteristic of him. He seemed more concerned about Perseus than the actual situation, which the messenger thought was sweet but at the same time very unneeded. “Should I fetch you something to drink? Perhaps something to eat?” Perseus wasn't obligated to do those things; Michael had servants to get him things if he was hungry or thirsty, but Perseus offered anyway because it was only polite. Besides, that's what friends were for.

            “No, Perseus, but thank you. They did find the death angel Nicholas…” Archangel Michael’s voice trailed off and he took a deep breath. “…but they found him curled in an alley with both his wings missing.”

            Perseus was pretty sure he was going to faint, and his heart wanted to beat out of his chest. His wings flared in aggravation and astonishment, and Michael’s mirrored his. “What would commit such a horrible crime? Demons? Fallen angels?” Perseus wasn't trying to hide the anxiety in his voice this time, and he worried his lip in between his teeth to the point where it bled. Michael’s brows knit with concern, but Perseus would have none of it, waving it off as the Archangel raised a hand to heal the wound. He almost immediately sobered and continued on with a professional note to his voice.

            “We’re currently trying to figure this out. Uriel had personally given the search party permission to communicate with the death angel, considering we’re normally forbidden from communicating with the fallen, and he managed to give quite the amount of information on his attackers,” Michael explained, “Nicolas claims that all of the culprits wore intricate and expensive masks, which means that they may be related to the disappearances of many other angels. He said that they wanted his wings and are therefore acquainted with the black market; he had been lured into a trap from a demon scale that he saw glittering on the ground while on patrol. It was his duty to inspect it, and he wound up caught in one of their traps.” He paused for a moment, eying Perseus, “I know what you’re thinking. No, you can’t go talk to him. Uriel only made an exception so we can prevent others from having the same fate. He’s fallen. We can have no more association with him.

            “But sir, I thought fallen angels were only those who were banished to Hell for doing crimes,” Perseus argued, his voice shaking. Had he been anyone else, he was pretty sure that that kind of tone would make Michael furious, but the Archangel only gave him a sympathetic look. He was well aware of the fact that Nicolas had been Perseus’ closest companion, and that losing him would really taking a toll on the poor messenger angel. He was already starting to feel himself sinking into a sort of numbness that made his knees feel weak.

            “Yes, but there are also those called the ‘artificially fallen.’ They have unintentionally lost their wings, either in an accident or, like in Nico’s case, they were chopped off by someone or something other than an Archangel. Sadly, they are still considered fallen angels,” Archangel explained in a melancholy tone. “It’s still forbidden by law that we make contact with them. I wish I could help you, Perseus, but that would mean going against the will of God. It’s my duty to follow His wishes and orders, and I certainly don’t want to end up like Lucifer had.”

            A tear trickled down Perseus’ cheek and Archangel Michael’s expression turned ever more pitying, which the messenger angel certainly didn’t want at the moment. “Don’t worry, I don’t blame you. Nobody wants to end up like Lucifer did,” the messenger angel managed to choke out through gritted teeth. “Is there any lead on the… _things_ that did this? I want their heads on my wall.”

            “Calm your nerves, Perseus. Make sure your wrath is contained.” Perseus took several deep breaths until the fury ebbed, replaced by a cold, hard determination. The numbness was spreading through his body, down to the tips of his toes, and Michael knew that the messenger angel’s wrath was only contained for the moment. It was only a matter of time until it resurfaced. “Archangel Gabriel has sent out some of his messengers and guard to try and acquire some information. So far, we are leaning towards demons. But some think that there may be mortals that know about our kind.”

            “May I humbly ask to be a part of those search parties, my lord?” Perseus asked. “I would like to know who did this to my comrade.” Archangel Michael chewed on his lip, knowing that that wasn't the entire truth; Perseus did want to find out who did it, but only because he wanted to skin them alive. He couldn’t let Perseus descend to such a level, but then again the search parties would likely kill the culprits as well. His messenger deserved to know who had severed Nicholas’ wings, and he certainly would be driven to find the culprits more than any other angel in the search party. Slowly, he nodded. “Thank you, sir.” With another bow Percy spread his black wings and shot out of the Archangel’s quarters like a bullet.


	4. The Heavenly Voyager

            The wind buffeted Jason as he stood crouched on the top of the Golden Swords’ headquarters, pummeling him with its frigid fists and trying to topple him from his perch. His icy blue eyes scanned the buildings for any flicker of movement that may suggest an angel was nearby; it’s not like angels came down in a blaze of parting clouds and divine choirs singing. They were sneaky little fuckers. Jason was trained to spot the shimmer of a halo or the glimpse of a feather from a long distance away, but it currently wasn’t benefiting him as of right now, though it had in the past. Luke had been right when he’d said that most of Jason’s hunts would be solitary after the group hunt, and, along with help from Leo’s many traps, Jason needed his sharp eyesight to find and hunt down any unlucky angels passing by.

            Jason had once needed glasses. He’d never been able to afford any, but once he’d cashed in his first set of wings he’d bought a nice pair. Cheap, but nice. It’d always been a burden for him, though; during training Luke would knock them off his face and it’d be easy to dispatch him from there, since all his blows were uncoordinated and incredibly inaccurate. None of the other members needed glasses, except for Leo who used enhanced goggles from time to time when working on new traps. The blond remembered when it’d happened. The Golden Swords had been eating in the mess hall, chatting amiably, but then all conversation had ceased when Luke had produced a large glass vial of red liquid from his jacket pocket. Everyone had looked away guiltily, not meeting Jason’s eyes when Luke had offered him some, and Jason could only suppose that it was a wine of some sort, and that the members of the Golden Swords were just trying to withhold their laughter until Jason found out how potent it was. Like the naïve boy he was, Jason took a large swig, though he didn’t like the cold gleam in Luke’s eyes as he did so.

            It was boiling hot, and he fanned his tongue, gulping down his entire glass of water. Even then, it didn’t help. The Golden Swords weren’t laughing, instead looking somewhat…guilty as the blond gasped and spluttered. He didn’t find it funny, and nobody else seemed to be laughing either. What the hell was that stuff? Tabasco sauce? It tasted really good, but it was so boiling hot and metallic that it ruined the flavor, and he glared at Luke from over his glasses when he finally managed to calm down. Luke had only grinned in response, and the conversation trickled back to the table as if nothing had happened. Then Jason realized that he was changing.

            His glasses now hurt his eyes, and he found himself seeing better without them, his vision incredible to the point that it was almost inhuman. His physical capabilities and mental strength had heightened as well, and the blond had only figured this out when he beat Reyna, the returning and undefeated champion, ten times in a row at arm wrestling. Before, he couldn’t even put up a fight. He found himself pinning Luke during their spars, and holding Annabeth at the end of his sword, and then and only then did he ask Luke what that drink had been. With a wicked grin, Luke told Jason that it had been angel blood had been given to him, not a single shred of remorse recognizable in his voice. Needless to say, Jason been disgusted, avoiding Luke, who’d begged for forgiveness when he found out that the blond was certainly not on board with downing angelic lifeblood. Jason had to admit that he was still frustrated at the guy, and would forever have a chip on his shoulder; the benefits of the heightened abilities was drowned out by the sinful taint that drinking the angel’s blood had left on Jason.

            He’d nearly quit angel hunting, the guilt burdening him too much.

 _You’re going to Hell. You’re going to Hell,_ the voices in his head crowed, chanting over and over again in a chilling litany that kept Jason awake most nights. He’d been on his way back to the headquarters to tell Annabeth that he was backing out, since the leader had clearly stated that they could leave whenever they liked, but then he’d seen Thalia amongst a group of people surrounding two men who were beating each other to a pulp. He saw her make the bet on the biggest and stronger-looking one, so naïve and unknowing of the world of street fighting, and it was almost expected that the scrawnier one produced a knife from his shirt and stab him five times in the chest. Thalia had bet way more than they could give, had been so sure that the winnings would’ve been able to pay off their debt, but she hadn’t expected that one of the fighters would cheat. They always cheated, and she and Jason were plunged so far into debt that it would take at least five years’ worth of angel wings to pay it off again. Jason had been furious with her for placing a bet that she knew she could possibly lose, but then Thalia had countered that if she’d won she would’ve been able to pay off the rest of the debt and get them a huge mansion all at once, so it may’ve been worth the risk. She claimed that it was better to bet with the peril of losing than to take up Jason’s unholy and satanic job of hunting angels.

            She had hit a nerve, no, scrap that, she’d smashed the nerve with a hammer. Her eyes had been so cold, her expression so furious and disappointed that the younger Grace had wanted to curl in on himself and die.

            “Don’t come back to the house,” she growled and had stalked off, her shift at the local supercenter starting in an hour that she had to get ready for. Jason had stood in the street, watching her go until she disappeared around the corner, and had waited for the better part of an hour, hoping and praying that she’d come back and hug him and say that she wanted her little brother to come home and that it’d all been a terrible mistake, but it never happened. Jason had slept at the Golden Swords’ headquarters for the past two years ever since. It had officially been four years since his first hunt and still Nicolas’ wails of agony and horrified expression haunted him in his nightmares, maybe as some sort of curse; a punishment for choosing the wrong path, and Jason completely and wholly believed that he deserved it. Thalia had never told him to stop sending money, so every week he left an envelope full to bursting with cash in the mailbox. It would be gone the next time he went to deposit, so he could only assume that the money was being put to good use. The loss of his sister was an open and festering wound that he could manage to ignore when he was occupied, but once he was alone with his thoughts he was nearly overwhelmed by how much he missed her.  

            The cold air nipped at Jason’s nose and cheeks, turning them a rosy red, and his black clothes blended in with the inky black sky. The night sky was overcast, the stars hidden behind a blanket of dreary grey clouds, and the air was filled with the sharp, metallic tang that signaled an an oncoming storm. Jason, however, was not daunted the slightest, unlike others who would run for the cover of their homes. He had an odd fondness for thunderstorms, much like his father had before he left him, Thalia, and their mother to flounder; he loved watching the rain pour down as lightning crackled and thunder rumbled. It cleared his head and made him calmer in a sense.  As the dark clouds rolled in, the wind picked up more speed to the point that it was battering Jason’s body as if he were a punching bag.

            He smiled to himself, which made the scar on his lip, which he’d earned from the nails of an irate guardian angel, quirk slightly. This was the absolute perfect weather for angel hunting. The clouds and potential rain provided shadows for him to slip in and out of, and angels were rendered unable to fly in the storm; the wind was too strong, and the rain would make their feathers damp, resulting in a slower, more labored flight or no flight at all. The angels were practically nothing without their flight, if you counted out the divine powers, and were incredibly easy to catch and fell.

            Jason tensed and quickly calculated the wind speed and direction to the closest approximation, and with a might leap (and with help from the angel blood) he glided over the gap in between the headquarters and the building beside it, which was shorter only by two or three inches. He had no need to go back into the facility and go through the only exit, which was also the only entrance; that one window that Luke had shouldered him into at gunpoint all those years ago. Since then, Jason had matured and grown stronger. He was no longer that scrawny kid on the street; he was the big kid on the block, the boy everyone avoided in order to stay safe. His muscles had become thick and corded from hours upon hours of back-breaking training; from pumping iron, to treadmills, to hand-to-hand combat and fighting with weapons, Jason was prepared for anything that the angels threw at him.

            He pulled on his gold eagle masquerade mask and slipped his hood over his head, which only further guaranteed his success when it came to disguising his identity. Even if the angel managed to wrestle the hood and mask off, the rain would make his hair a shade darker from dampness and distort his features as well. His plan was foolproof. As if on cue, lightning violently flashed overhead and rain began to pour down in sheets. The throaty bellow of thunder followed and the wind screamed across the city, demanding attention as it slammed on people’s doors and attacked pedestrians who were running late, wrenching umbrellas from their hands and tearing at their coats.

            Jason leapt from building to building, finally descending a shrieking and groaning fire escape and making his way towards Seraphim Lane, where Leo had told him he’d set one of the traps. He kept his head down, shrouding his face and mask in shadow as to not attract attention. The street lights flickered once, twice, and went out. Apartment windows closed and locked and blinds were drawn. Lightning streaked across the sky like a bullet and cast dancing shadows across the city that disappeared soon after, like awaiting demons that were expecting their next meal.

            It didn’t scare Jason, though his stomach twisted as it always did when he hunted angels. Even when contained, angels fought as if their immortality depended on it when their wings were at stake. He’d seen his comrades injured more than once for not taking enough caution around restrained angels. It was like going on a roller coaster; no matter how many times you went on, you still got the fluttering feeling in your stomach as you waited for the car to take off. It was really the anticipation’s fault, but this time it was also the thrill of the possibly life-threatening danger.

            He picked his way towards the street, checking his surroundings warily. Every crack of thunder, which normally soothed him, made him jump, and even the skittering of a rat or mouse made his hairs stand on end. His footsteps on the street would’ve been as if he were stomping if the night had been still, considering he was the only one out at this hour, but Jason had to admit that he was thankful for the horrible weather, for now he didn’t have to be so careful about walking lightly.

            Lightning split the sky once more, illuminating a dented and rather mangled sign that read Seraphim Lane. Jason slunk around the corner, his movements catlike and his eyes darting back and forth as he scanned his surroundings, his enhanced eyesight seeing easily in the dark. He didn’t hear any sound of struggle, but then again he couldn’t hear much of anything over the howling of the wind and the beating of the rain that poured down. He was aware of everything around him; the perilous shaking of the electrical wire above, the harsh clang as trashcans overturned, and the occasional honk of a car horn in the distance. Other than that, he was alone, or so he thought. Leo had said that he’d placed the trap in the third alley to the right, and Jason quietly tiptoed across the street.

            He froze up when he swore he heard he beating of wings, but dismissed it as just the wind, even though his heart stuttered and began to speed up, blood beginning to roar in his ears as he approached the opening to the alley. He produced a long knife from his belt, which would be perfect for both defense and cutting off his victim’s wings, though he tried not to think of the latter. With a deep breath in vain attempt to calm his racing heart, he whirled around the corner, his knife at the ready. He peered into the dark alley, the blackness swimming and shifting in front of him like a dark wave. He looked at the ground and saw the shimmer of a demon scale.

            So the trap hadn’t been sprung. Jason tried to conceal his disappointment, his jaw clenching as he ground his teeth together in mild aggravation. He knew that it would be dangerous to step any further than he was, for fear of triggering a trap set for an immortal angel and not a human boy; things such as an iron net wouldn’t even hurt an angel the slightest, only restrain it. It would crush any mere mortal that was unfortunate enough to spring the trap, and it had happened in the past.

            “Stop right there!” an unfamiliar voice shouted, and the feeling of what was clearly a sword jabbing in between his shoulder blades nearly made Jason stagger. Not wanting to spring the trap and get crushed, he whirled around at the person who was threatening him, his knife at the ready. He came face to face with the most beautiful angel he had ever seen, and that was coming from a guy who had it for the ladies. Seriously, he would gladly go homo for this guy. He had the looks of a Greek god; tousled black hair that was plastered to his forehead and neck from the rain, brilliant sea-green eyes that glowed dimly in the darkness of the storm, and a chiseled chest that would make male models make a run for their money. Even the straightest of men would have zero problem banging him when he saw his V-line peeking out from his torn jeans, and on top of that he was wearing combat boots. He looked like a G.I. Joe turned to modeling, and Jason could very clearly picture him in the heavenly attire some angels wore, strumming a harp or gutting his enemies. Unfortunately, Jason seemed to be one of those “enemies”.

            The most noticeable thing about him, however, were the two wings that spread behind him. Jason nearly drooled. They were gigantic, about ten feet each, adding up to a staggering twenty foot wingspan. They were almost certainly powerful, the muscles rippling beneath the feathers, which suggested that he was a messenger angel; they needed large wings to carry them around. They were smaller than the ones in the meeting room, but that made them no less ginormous, each feather shaking like a leaf in the harsh wind. It may have been just the rain and the darkness, but Jason swore that they were the color of shadows in the night.

 _“In all my years of angel hunting I have never seen an angel with completely black wings,”_ Luke had said.

 _Oh, God,_ Jason thought. _Jackpot._ The angel bared his teeth and leveled his sword at Jason’s throat. _If he doesn’t kill you first,_ a voice in his head added.

            “What do you want?” he asked smoothly despite the fact that inside he was very much terrified. Never before had he seen an angel this aggressive; the angels he had hunted alone had always been calm and friendly up to the point where he subdued them and hacked their wings off. This one seemed to purposely want to kill him. Then it struck Jason; did the angels find out about the Golden Swords? Were the Archangels sending their minions out to kill them?

            “Take off your mask,” the angel growled, the sword wavering as his hands trembled. The fury and hatred in his voice was so severe that it nearly confirmed Jason’s suspicions that the Golden Swords had been discovered.

            “I’m sorry, but I can’t do that,” Jason replied, pushing the tip of the sword away from his throat nonchalantly. His blue eyes flashed venomously and for a moment a look of worry and uncertainty passed across the angel’s face, but it disappeared as fast as it had come.

            “In all my life I have never seen a demon before,” the angel remarked, mostly to himself. _So they haven’t figured out about the Golden Swords,_ Jason thought, relieved. _They think that it’s just a gang of demons. I’d better play along. Use the angel’s fear to your advantage. He’s nervous._ The only problem was that Jason knew a lot about angels but very little about demons. He’d better keep it vague, cold, and icy; not giving too much away. Then when the angel least expected it, he’d pounce. The angel continued, “I’m guessing that’s yours?” He gestured to the scale that was glittering with a dark light at the end of the alley.

            “Most likely. I mean, I’m the only demon around, aren’t I?” Jason retorted slyly, pumping as much potency into his words as possible. To simply ruffle the angel a little, he added, “I thought you were taught much better than to talk to creatures like me.”

            “You are unholy and powered on sin and the suffering of others, you beast. You’re lucky that I’m not attacking right now,” he warned. “But I need information, and you will give it to me or else I’ll hack you to bits.”

            “I prefer myself in one piece, thank you very much.” Jason replied, packing as much sarcasm into his comment as humanly possible. The angel made a growling sound in his throat, his green eyes sparkling murderously as he raised his wings in an aggressive stance, and it took all of Jason’s willpower not to run away screaming. Angels could be quite terrifying when they wanted to be. He tried to keep the tremble out of his voice when he added, “And I’m not sure what information you’re referring to.”

            “Are all of you this snarky?” he scoffed, but Jason knew well enough that it was a rhetorical question. “May I see your scale? I need to analyze it and confirm that you are, indeed, the one responsible for all of these angelic disappearances.” Jason shoved away the anxiety that built up when the angel mentioned the fact that Heaven was aware of the Golden Swords’ activities, instead concentrating on the need to make a split decision. He could agree, which would be totally against demon nature and blow his cover, or he could refuse and possibly let his prey escape.

            “I’d prefer you not,” Jason replied icily, stepping in front of the angel, who was making a move towards the scale, and the trap. He turned, his green eyes blazing, and Jason suppressed a whimper as they bored into him.

            “I suppose that you’re using it to lure in the desperate mortals here? All of whom are willing to find and pawn and sell anything to make a quick buck?” he asked. Jason nearly hesitated. The angel would try to kill him over a stupid scale; why was he even doing this in the first place?

            “Why, you’re right,” Jason replied smoothly. “You’ve caught me red-handed. Go ahead, bird boy.” He made sure to keep a ‘but I’d rather you not’ hinted in the undertone. The angel snarled at the nickname and tried to get past once more, but Jason blocked his path. He knew he was making this harder for himself; that all the angel would have to do was pick up the scale and then the trap would be sprung, but he needed to stay in character.

            As Luke had once said, the person you’re lying to is more likely to buy your bluff if you believe the lie is true. _I am a demon from the fifth circle of hell. My name is…_ Jason struggled to come up with a name that sounded demon-ish besides Lucifer. _…Asmodeus and I have killed many angels and stripped them of their wings. I am aware that the Archangels are suspicious of my activity and therefore I must keep everything vague._ Jason felt a little better after making up the story. He felt as if he had become Asmodeus, this made-up demon.

            “Listen, demon,” the angel hissed like a snake, and even though Jason was a few inches taller he fucking _loomed_ over him. It must’ve been the wings. “For four years I have been searching for the one guilty of mercilessly and unfairly stripping my friend of his wings. I will stop at nothing to catch them and turn them in to the Archangels. They will be brought to justice.” Jason nearly gulped; now that he was aware of the messenger angel’s intentions, he wasn’t so sure that acting like a demon was the right way to go. Nevertheless, he shrugged and stepped out of the way.

            The angel approached the scale, his head on a swivel. He looked from Jason to the scale and back again, making sure that the “demon” didn’t make any false moves. Jason felt the anticipation gnawing at his stomach as the angel approached the trap that would ultimately leave him wingless. He subtly reached for his gun so that he could shoot the angel if he decided to fly off. He was not leaving here without those gorgeous black wings; this angel would be the last angel he hunted, for those wings would fetch for a higher price than any of the other wings he had sold, thus getting him and Thalia out of debt and into the lap of luxury.

            The angel approached the scale, looking it over carefully. _C’mon, c’mon, c’mon. Take the bait._ Jason thought desperately. Time seemed to drag out as the angel studied the scale on the ground and Jason noticed a little rock right by the angel’s foot; the pressure activation would spring the trap if the angel just took on teeny step closer. That’s when he stiffened and whirled around to Jason, raising his sword.

            “Do you think you could really fool me that easily, young human?” the angel roared over the crash of thunder and bellowing of the wind. The rain seemed to pour down harder and Jason wondered whether his anger was affecting the storm or not. Was he really powerful enough to have the ability to do that? Even so, Jason was shocked; he had played right into the angel’s hands. He knew he should’ve been suspicious and not taken up that whole act. Now the angel was on to him.

            “You stripped Nicolas of his wings, fool! He was my blood brother, and for that you will pay dearly.” Before the angel could even finish Jason already had his gun out and had fired two shots that were drowned out by the raging tempest. One missed by an inch and sent the brick wall splintering, but the other buried itself into the angel’s side. He screamed and stumbled as blood gushed from the wound. Jason faltered; that scream had sounded so human it wrenched his heart. Perseus was just looking for his friend. He was just angry that Jason had stripped Nicolas o his wings, which was kind of creepy considering Nicolas had been his first hunt to ever successfully complete. _Just take his wings and you won’t have to hear screams like that anymore._ Jason thought to himself. His moment of hesitation gave the angel just enough time to tackle him.

            They rolled on the ground, yelling and raining punches on one another. The angel brought his fist down on his nose and a spike of unparalleled pain signaled that it was broken, considering Jason could hear for shit with the cacophony around him. He was covered in the angel’s blood and the metallic tang was suffocating him, clearly bothering the angel as well, but they continued to fight.

Finally, the angel’s strength prevailed as he towered over Jason, his silhouette and halo outlined by the lightning for a single moment. Jason was terrified, his heart slamming against his ribcage, and his hands were pinned to his sides, unable to reach any of his knives or swords, and his gun had slid out of reach. The angel was on top of him, breathing hard. The gun wound was still bleeding heavily to the point where it would’ve killed him if he hadn’t been immortal. “You’re angel hunting ends here,” he growled and snatched the gun off the floor, pressing the barrel against Jason’s head. “Any last words before I pull the trigger and your tainted soul is dragged to the depths of Hell?”

            “Yes,” Jason spat. The angel tilted his head to the side, a smile playing on his lips.

            “And what would that be?” he asked, clearly amused.

            “Your wings will look great on my wall.” Jason saw the look of horror and confusion on the angel’s face as he raised his knife and stabbed him in the chest. There was a moment where the messenger angel just looked tired, the shadows under his eyes more profound that before, but then he fell forwards. Pinned by the angel’s weight, Jason wriggled out from under him, grabbing his gun and training it on the fallen form of the angel. He prodded him a bit, making sure that he was in that coma-like state that angels slipped into before they healed from very major wounds.

            “Better get on with it before he gets up,” Jason muttered to himself, the pity evident in his voice. He shoved his gun into his holster and took out his knife, studying it as the blade gleamed in the light of the lightning that flashed overhead. He began to saw through the angel’s wings, despising the sound as he cut through the bone, flesh, and muscle connecting it to the angel’s back. He tried to hold back the tears, but they slipped free and mingled with the raindrops on his face. One black wing fell to the ground, leaving a bloodied stump behind that continued to bleed heavily. The angel had only wanted to avenge his friend. He just wanted to find the one who tethered him to Earth so he could finally have some peace of mind. He was just as human as anyone else. The next fell, too, and with that it was over. Still crying, Jason gathered up his prizes in his arms and wrapped them in a blanket.

            He turned to leave, but remorse made him took back, the remorse that came with only knowing a tiny sliver of the celestial being’s story. Of who he actually was. The angel was lying on his side, unmoving. Throw a shirt on him and he’d pass as human. His face was peaceful and calm in his forced sleep, not even a single twitch of an eyelid, and his head was pillowed on one of his arms. The pity and guilt clawed at Jason as he saw the angel bleeding from the wound in his side, the stumps that were once wings, and from the knife wound in his chest.

            Jason thought of what he’d be like when he woke up to find his wings missing. It would be much more horrible than when Nico was conscious and his wings got chopped off. Knowing that you had been knocked out cold while someone sawed off what made you special would really make him suffer.

            Without even thinking, Jason walked over and picked the angel up, careful not to crush the wings that were also in his arms. He was so light that Jason nearly dropped him out of astonishment, but he managed to retain a grip on the angel’s unconscious bleeding form. _Great; first angel hunting, now taking angel hostages, what a new low,_ Jason thought sourly. _I’m just going to nurse him back to health and then set him free, but not before I sell the wings. No talking to him. No nothing. Just business_. With a sigh he began to carry the angel and the wings back to his home at the Golden Swords’ headquarters, where hopefully everyone was asleep


	5. Splintered Illusions

_Darkness. Fear. Pain. Perseus had never been in the forced coma, known as the Healing Slumber among angels, in order to heal from major wounds. In fact, the worst ‘wound’ he’d ever suffered from was a broken arm when he was merely one hundred years old and was learning to fly, and when he stubbed his pinky toe on the edge of the table. That had hurt something awful._

_But this was a whole new world of agony that was much worse than a broken arm or a stubbed toe. It burned through him like liquid fire that seared his flesh and bone, running through his veins as if it had replaced his blood. The knife cut through his skin like butter and he had to relive it over and over and over again as the wound sealed up. His back ached and burned, but Perseus had no idea why. Was this just a side-effect from the Healing Slumber? But something told him that it was much more and much worse than that._

_He was running down a path in a pine forest that stretched on and on and on. His bare feet slammed against the dirt path, and they were cut up and bleeding. Every step was agony. The sky was the color of ink and without stars or a moon, like a black tarp was stretched over the Earth, and it made him feel like he was suffocating. He had no idea what he was running from, but he knew that it was bad, and his heart roared in his chest as the muscles in his legs screamed. Blue eyes glared at him through the trees, merciless and cold to the core. They burned holes into him like fire…hellfire that scorched and devoured him as it coursed through his body._

_Eagles made of gold screeched and dove at him, their claws outstretched and their wings creaking and groaning like poorly oiled machines as they assaulted him. He couldn’t fly and he didn’t have his sword, so he vainly tried to swat away the serrated talons that clawed at his skin. The eagles continued to attack him, regrouping and gaining ranks until they were swarming him like a colony of angry bees. Their cries, combined with the clatter of their wings, was so loud that he was pretty sure his ears were bleeding, and his wail of pain and terror was lost amongst the cacophony. Their screeching sounded like human screams and their eyes burned a blue like the ones peering at him from the trees. One of the eagles broke from the rest and launched into the sky. It opened its beak and spoke:_

_“Your wings will look good on my wall,” and it dove down for the finishing blow, its talons outstretched._

Perseus woke up screaming, his heart beating out of his chest. When he realized that there was no pine forest and no golden eagles in sight, he collapsed back onto the mattress and curled up, burying his face into the comfort and warmth. It was just a dream, just a horrible, horrible dream. That’s when he noticed the raw pain in his back that spiked and burned whenever he moved. He opened his eyes and turned to check on his wings, making sure that they weren’t damaged or ruffled.

            He screeched like one of the eagles from his dream.

            His wings were gone, nothing but bloodied stumps, and he let out a ragged breath before he began to cry, something he hadn’t done since before Earth was even a twinkle in God’s eye. It hadn’t been a dream. He let out a wail as tears streamed down his face and curled up on the bed that he just realized was not _his_ bed.

            “My wings!” he screamed as his body was racked with violent sobs. His beautiful, reliant, powerful black wings had been chopped off. He was a fallen angel. Like Nico. Like the countless innocents who were also the victims of this cruelty. He couldn’t deliver messages to Michael. He couldn’t visit his mother and father during Christmastime. He couldn’t launch himself into the sky with the wind in his hair and on his face. _He couldn’t go home_. The gates of Heaven were closed to him, now.

            “ _Why?_ ” he sobbed, his voice ragged and barely a whisper. “Why me?” He buried his face into his hands and cried until his tear sacs threatened to burst.

            He’d lost so much in so little time, and the overwhelming need to get outside crashed into him. He made a move to get out of bed when a loud jangling sound interrupted his thoughts. He looked up to see a gleaming metal bracelet around his right wrist, a thick chain connecting it to the bed. Now he was a prisoner. Yet another realization sent his sanity spiraling out of control as he tried to handle all of the horrible events that were crashing down upon him. His world was disintegrating all around him, and he had to force himself not to cry. He was a warrior. A reliant and respected messenger for an Archangel. He didn’t _cry_. Only…he _was_ a warrior. He _was_ a messenger. A single tear leaked from the corner of his eye, and he felt like he was going to break down, but his pitiful pity party was disrupted by the sound of the metal door squealing open.

            He looked up to see a boy about eighteen or nineteen, holding a tray of supplies in his hands. From what Perseus could see, there was a bowl of water, some cloth, rolls of bandages and gauze, and painkillers. His hair was disheveled and there were deep, defined shadows under his eyes. But that wasn’t the thing that set him off; it was those icy blue eyes that he had seen in his nightmare, the eyes that he had seen through the eagle masquerade mask boring into him without remorse. This was the person that had done this to him. This was the human that had turned him into this.

            Perseus looked at him with broken sea-green eyes as he set the tray on a table next to him and pulled a stool from the corner of the small room that was his cell. The fallen angel despised this human for cutting of his wings, but he could do nothing in this weakened state, even though he really wanted to punch the human so hard his jaw fractured. It didn’t help that his dominant hand was chained to the bed. Besides, he feared the repercussions for it. Maybe his fingers would be chopped off next. Or his toes.

            “Looks like you’re all healed up,” the human remarked almost nonchalantly and reached over. Perseus let out a hiss and bared his teeth, recoiling from the mortal’s outstretched hands. The human seemed to grow impatient but let his hands fall to his sides, respecting Perseus’ wish not to be touched. “Don’t be so difficult. I need to check your bandages. Lie down,” he ordered. Perseus just looked at him, noticing with satisfaction the bandage over the bridge if his nose; it had been broken, most likely by him. He refused to be ordered around by a human, especially the one that got him into this mess in the first place.

            The mortal, seeming fed up, made a grab for him and the angel acted on instinct, _biting_ him. The human let out a cry of alarm and let out a low groan of pain as he watched blood well and trickle from the teeth marks on the back of his hand. For a moment the angel was satisfied, but then he saw the glare that the blond was giving him. The glare that he’d seen right before the knife was plunged into his chest. Perseus froze, if only for a moment, but knew that he had to remain strong. In control. The human stormed from the room and left the door hanging open, which the angel found cruel considering A) he was chained, B) the bed was bolted to the floor, and C) he was too weak to tear it from the ground and make his escape, even if it meant having a cot drag behind him. The door revealed nothing but an empty wall, hallways branching off to either side, and it made him irritated that he couldn’t scope out his new surroundings.

            He couldn’t dwell on that, however, because that’s when Jason returned with two more human males. One was blond, though his hair was a bit sandier, and the other looked like some sort of imp creature. Both were revolting in the angel’s eyes, and he would’ve flared his wings in warning if they were still attached to his body. The thought made him want to sob, but instead he snarled, recoiling from them as they approached. They’d obviously discussed what they were going to do with him beforehand, because suddenly the two new humans were upon him, yanking the covers and tossing them to the side. Perseus mourned their warmth. The blond grabbed his hands and pinned them to the mattress while the imp kept a firm grip on his legs.

            The angel did the only thing he could; he screamed. The two seemed to flinch as he screamed himself hoarse, writhing and thrashing, and they grunted with the effort of holding him down, yet they still managed to do so with ease in the angel’s weakened state. The Blue Eyes was watching them off to the side, having moved the tray closer to the bed so it was now within reach of the chair placed beside it. After what seemed like hours but was only mere minutes, Perseus had exhausted his meager amount of energy and did what no dignified warrior would ever do.

            He gave up.

            Letting out a ragged breath, Perseus went limp, completely at the mercy of these humans. He felt so helpless. So small. When he shifted, he could feel the unforgiving and unyielding hands holding him down to the bed, and a single tear made its way down his cheek. He regarded Blue Eyes with eyes like broken glass, and he whimpered when the human examined the soggy red bandages that he just realized were wrapped around his torso. The human hushed him, not unkindly, and set to work. His hands were quick and efficient as they removed the old bandages and replaced them with new ones, even though the wound was nothing but a nasty scar now. Perseus wasn't required to move, since the other two humans lifted him up easily whenever it was required. Curse his hollow bones that were made for flight. They were only a burden for him now.

            Perseus whined and struggled feebly as the mortal touched the tender skin around the knife scar gently, seeing if it needed any further treatment. The two other humans grunted and squeezed his wrists and ankles harder, efficiently immobilizing him, and he quickly ceased when he found his efforts were fruitless. Blue Eyes drew away as quickly as possible, seemingly unwilling to make Perseus suffer more than he had to, and began working on the bandages around his abdomen, where he’d been shot. That was nothing but a scar, too, thanks to the help of the Healing Slumber.

            “Easy, easy,” he soothed as Perseus began to cry out in agony.

            “I want to go home!” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them, and he tensed up all over as the atmosphere thickened considerably, the tension so dense you could cut it with a knife. They were regarding him with something akin to pity, which was exactly what Perseus didn’t want, and he refused to meet their gazes, instead turning to the wall. With tenderness that Perseus didn’t expect when it came to these particular humans, they eased the angel onto his stomach, revealing the ugly stumps where his wings used to be. Flesh had grown over the wounds and a few bloody black feathers clung to the marred area, but other than that they looked like the stumps that would be left behind if a chicken’s head was cut off. It was utterly mortifying and horrible. “This is going to hurt,” the mortal warned and took a cloth from the tray, wetting it in the bowl of water.

            Perseus screamed as he pressed the cloth down on one of the stumps. He arched his back and thrashed, and the humans made a mistake flipping him over; now their arms were completely exposed. Before any of them could react he sunk his teeth, which he found were becoming more useful by the minute, into the blond’s right arm.

“Fuck!” he bellowed, and let go completely to cradle the bleeding wound, and it didn’t take long before the angel lashed out with his left hand, unable to help the spike of satisfaction as his fist connected with Blue Eyes’ jaw. The blow sent the human staggering, almost bringing him to his knees, and the imp creature let out a cry:

“Jason!”

            So that blue-eyed monster had a name. Jason. He felt his strength returning as he kicked out at the impish human until he was free, then effectively slamming his foot square in the middle of the boy’s chest, knocking the wind out of him. The blond was still cradling his arm, and the three regrouped near the door, and the angel loved the fact that they were wary of him. This was how it should be. He should be feared. Perseus snarled at them, his green eyes flashing murderously. He hated these humans with all of his being, Jason especially; he had become a victim of the human that he had been seeking for four years instead of catching him. The two other humans retreated, grumbling to one another, and I smirked in satisfaction. Jason set his jaw, his eyes blazing angrily, and it took all of Jason’s willpower not to shrink back.

            “If you’d been better-behaved I would have fetched some food for you,” he snorted and Perseus’ stomach chose that time to rumble loudly. Hunger ate away at his insides and he wanted to ask Jason how long he had been in the Healing Slumber, but he was already gone, slamming the metal door closed behind him. Perseus groaned and collapsed back onto the pillows, tears threatening to spill over as his body ached for the weight of his wings on his back. Exhausted, he slipped into a thankfully dreamless sleep.

 

\----Ω----

 

            “I think we should toss him out to the streets. We never gave this sort of extensive care to an angel before. Besides, the beast attacked us when we were clearly trying to help him,” a vaguely familiar, gruff voice scoffed. Perseus nearly stirred, but he knew that he may gather more information if he pretended that he was still asleep.

            “He was panicked and scared, I don’t blame him,” replied another voice that he immediately recognized as Jason. “It’s just that when I cut his wings…I felt so bad. I couldn’t leave him in an alley like that. He’s such a free spirit, so arrogant and cocky you can’t help but feel a little sympathy. The only reason he’s so…misbehaved is because he’s frightened. This is all new territory for him. I wonder what his name is.”

            “Yeah well the stupid creature _bit_ me,” the other grouched.

            “Sorry about that. I forgot to tell you he’s a biter,” Jason admitted sheepishly, and he was no doubt showing his companion the neat teeth marks on the back of his hand. Perseus wanted to grin in triumph. They both deserved everything they’d gotten, and he felt glad that he was able to fend them off. “He’s just scared, though. He was looking for his friend, who just so happened to be Nicolas, the first angel I hunted.” Perseus bit back a snarl, because now he had proof that Jason was, indeed, the one who’d cruelly ripped his blood brother away from him. He wanted to tear the mortal apart with his bare hands.

            “He _sunk his teeth into my_ flesh,” the other human complained. “It hurts like a bitch, and he probably-wait his eye moved!” Perseus cursed himself, but reluctantly he let his eyes flutter open. He was in the same room as last time, only he was in a much worse situation. Now both of his wrists were shacked to the bed, and his ankles had joined in on the fun as well. He barely had any room to move, much less shift his position, and the protruding stumps made him incredibly uncomfortable. Two mortals were standing next to him, one being Jason and the other guy being the human who’d held his arms down. Only now did he notice the huge scar running down the side of his face.  

            He craned his neck to the side to look at his captors, squinting as the light hurt his eyes. “Welcome to this new arrangement, troublemaker. If you’d been at least mildly approachable and less ‘I’m going to rip out your eyeballs with my teeth’ maybe you could have stayed in the other one.” the buff guy growled coldly, purposefully flexing his forearm, which was covered in bandages.

            “Luke, please,” Jason soothed, putting a hand on his partner, Luke’s shoulder. “At least act nice.”

            “Are you kidding, Jason? What is it about this angel that makes you so soft? You’ve been working day in day out to make sure this creature is okay without worrying about your own health. You should’ve left him on the streets,” Luke snarled.

            “And leave him exposed and helpless at the hands of other angel hunters who would rather have an arm, an eye, or a leg rather than his wings? You said that making them suffer is one of the lowest of crimes, and I did ruffle him up pretty badly; a bullet wound and a knife wound, with the severed wings on top of that. It took him three days to completely heal, Luke. _Three days,_ ” Jason retorted. Luke made a growling sound in his throat and stormed out, slamming the iron door behind him.

            Before Perseus could even stop the words from coming out of his mouth, he said, “Thanks. You know, for defending me.” Jason seemed surprised at the comment, so he quickly added, “But I’m still fairly aggravated that you seem to think you have the authority to cut off my wings. Those were a part of my body, you know.”

            “I know,” Jason hissed through his teeth and looked down at the floor, seeming guilty. “But you see…” he trailed off, contemplating whether it was a smart idea to tell the angel his reasons for chopping of his wings. Perseus didn’t pressure him, because even if the lousy mortal had reduced him to a fallen angel, he still deserved to be shown manners. Well, no, he didn’t, but Perseus didn’t want to scare him off and leave him in the dark about why he’d descended into such sin. Jason knelt beside the bed so that his eyes were level with the messenger angel’s. “First and foremost, I am not the richest of guys, okay?”

            Perseus nodded, trying to keep his expression stern, but it was difficult as the human spoke with such disgust that was directed towards himself; at lest he still had some remorse to offer. The rage that fueled him was enough, though, and he managed to keep an air of indifference.

             “My sister, Thalia, and I, well we were in a load of debt. And I’m talking in the millions, you hear? We were kicked from our perfect suburban house and forced to move to a run-down shed in this God awful community, all because our father left and our mother was an alcoholic. We don’t get bills because we have no electricity. No running water. The house itself was only around three thousand dollars or so, but it only added on to what we owed. I worked two day jobs six days a week, as did my sister. We weren’t getting anywhere; our money solely for paying off the debt and not for anything else. We used to scrounge for food like disgusting rats, but then Luke found me and took me in, along with a few other people.

            “He said that I could make a living off hunting down angels and cutting off their wings,” At this Percy made a disgusted sound, but Jason persisted, “I know, I know. Don’t rub it in. He told me that I had potential, that by selling those wings I could pay off the debt and move back to the house. It was only supposed to last about three years, but then Thalia lost this bet on a street fight, plunging us so deep that I’d have to hunt angels for at least another five years. Then…then I saw your wings. I was going to let you go, but those wings of yours…well they got us out of debt.”

            Perseus made a strangled sound. “Hold on, so you’re implying that you sold my wings? You don’t have them?” Jason wrung his hands in his lap but nodded guiltily. Perseus nearly screamed; he wanted to beat the stupid human to death, he wanted to strangle him. No matter what his sob story was behind his wicked deeds, it was still the most sinful job any individual could take up in order to pay off debt. “So you can’t give them back to me.”

            “No. Someone else has them. Their name is classified,” Jason replied flatly, rising to his feet. Perseus felt a tear streak down his face and forced the rest of them to stay put until Jason left. Instead, the human sat down on the edge of the table and gave him a soft smile. The angel spat at him, but he didn’t seem to mind as he wiped saliva off his shirt. He stared at the angel balefully, and he could feel the ghost of his breath over his face as he exhaled. “Listen,” he whispered softly, “I don’t expect, or deserve for that matter, forgiveness, but I’m telling you right now that I regret every single waking moment of being an angel hunter. I had to do it for my family, or at least what family I have left.” With that he departed, his head down and his shoulders hunched, closing the door behind him. The angel stared after him for a few moments, angry that a part of him wanted company.


	6. Man of Many Worlds

            Jason chewed on his lip as he sat by his captive, unwilling to rouse him. He looked so peaceful when he was sleeping; there was no panic, anger, pain, or hatred in his expression, just simple bliss. “I’m jealous,” he murmured to himself and brushed a loose strand of raven black hair out of the angel’s face quickly and professionally, knowing that the angel, with his chained hands, would be unable to do so. As he did this, the angel’s eyes snapped open, the green intensity of his gaze blazing to life as he jerked violently out of his sleep, almost as if he were forcing himself to do so.

            Jason quickly drew away and the angel looked at him, his expression rather bemused. “Are you checking me out, human?” he taunted and purposely flexed is chiseled and defined muscles. His bare chest showed off his six-pack and pectorals, making Jason rather envious, but then again the angel was perfect because, well, he was an angel and Jason was just a mortal. Jason looked away, the tips of his ears tinged red.

            “No, no, no, no. I’m not…like that. I’m not…uh…err…” he carefully tried to phrase in the most politically correct and vague, hinting way possible.

            “To paraphrase it, you’re not homosexual,” the angel said flatly.

            “Uh…you mean-?” Jason had to admit that he was tongue-tied; he never knew that an angel would say the word ‘homosexual.’ You had to admit, it wasn’t something that came to mind on a normal occasion.

            “Homosexual; gay, opposite of heterosexual, describing an individual who is attracted to the same sex, from Ancient Greek ὁμός, meaning ‘same’, and Latin sexus, meaning ‘sex’, an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions primarily or exclusively to people of the same sex. Yes, that,” the angel snorted in reply.

            “What, did you memorize the dictionary or something?” Jason scoffed and crossed his arms over his chest. He was surprised at the answer.

            “Why, yes, yes I have,” the angel said, his voice dead serious. Jason nearly burst out laughing, but managed to hold his tongue. He didn’t want to offend the angel in any way, shape, or form; he was already on his bad side and didn’t want to stress that even further. He couldn’t hide his amused smile, though.

            “Who has time for that?” he chuckled and the angel smiled at him. Was there even the slightest chance that they would be able to tolerate each other?

            “People who are immortal and have access to the biggest archive in all of creation,” the green-eyed angel replied simply and they lapsed into an awkward silence as Perseus looked away, his expression a bit pained.

            “Fine,” Jason sighed and the angel didn’t respond, his eyes trained on the wall and his gaze determined not to meet Jason’s. He picked up the food tray off the floor and set it in his lap. It was piled high with fruit, vegetables, bacon, and pancakes with a butt load of syrup. The angel’s nostrils flared a bit at the smell but he didn’t react, not even glancing at the gracious meal in the human’s lap. “Breakfast.”

            “No,” Perseus hissed sharply, glaring at the wall. Jason had had it with the angel’s antics, and he quickly set the fork and knife down from where he was cutting the pancakes into manageable pieces.

            “Listen, Almighty Dickbag. You’re going to eat this fucking pancake or I’m going to get the funnel. And trust me, you’d rather want the pancakes than the nutritional slop we have as backup,” he snarled.

            “It’s not your decision whether I will or will not eat,” the messenger angel replied coldly. “You’ve already seemed to decide that I’d be much better off on Earth than in Heaven.” Wow. Low blow. It efficiently shut Jason up, and he ground his teeth together as he tried to find a way to communicate how much he needed the angel to eat that didn’t involve holding the angel’s face and shoving the food down his throat.

            “C’mon, I know you’re hungry. I’ll feed you,” he offered. Wrong thing to say.

            “I _refuse_ be fed like a child by the likes of you,” the angel growled. “That Luke boy was right. I would’ve been much better off in the streets.”

            “You know what? Fuck you,” Jason bellowed. “You will eat and you will _like it_.” Perseus turned his head slowly, and for a moment he saw the sadness filled in those green eyes of his, but it was quickly clouded by a hard indifference. He leaned as close as he could manage in his bonds, his lips peeling back in a chilling sneer.

            “Bite me.”

            “Oh for fuck’s sake-” Jason threw his hands into the air, snatching the food from his lap and slamming it down so hard that the silverware rattled and a little water sloshed out of the glass cup.

            The angel flinched but that was the only indication that he was the least bit intimidated by Jason, who was just about to storm out of the room when he croaked, “I’ll eat. Please don’t hurt me.” He sounded so small. So vulnerable. Jason’s fury drained out of him completely as he sat back down.

            “I won’t hurt you. I promise,” he snorted, “No matter how much you piss me off.” The angel cracked a smile, the first one Jason had seen from him. It seemed to light up the room, lopsided and revealing the celestial being’s amusement, if only for a moment, before it was gone, replaced by that hard-set line.

            “I still don’t want to be fed by you. Besides, you are not homosexual and this may be slightly intimate, considering feeding one another is sometimes considered erotic,” the angel stated bluntly.

            “Trust me, I don’t want to feed you any more than you want to be fed by me,” Jason sighed. “But I can’t risk you biting me or nailing me in the face again if I unchain your hands”

            “I would totally do it again if I had the chance,” the black-haired angel admitted, though he was smirking slightly. Jason officially made it his mission to see that smirk more often. They managed to struggle through the feeding process, the angel seeming uncomfortable with being hand fed and incredibly nervous, to the point where he accidentally bent the prongs of the fork when he bit down. “Sorry,” he rushed, looking mortified, and Jason just waved him off, grinning. When they were finally finished, with the angel grudgingly telling the human that the meal was, indeed, good, Jason decided to hit him with the big question.

            “So, what’s your name?” he asked hesitantly, and the angel snapped to attention, his green eyes glinting warily. Jason rushed to cover for himself, “I mean, you don’t have to, but since you know my name and I’m trying to be a good person here and make up for my mistakes I thought-”

            “Perseus,” the angel cut in. Jason paused, blinking owlishly at him. He hadn’t actually expected the messenger to reply. “My name is Perseus.” He took a moment to process that information. He was named after a Greek hero like Jason, but it was most likely that the Greek hero was named after Perseus the angel. Only then did he realize that the angel was looking at him with something akin to anxiety tinging his features.

            “Cool name,” Jason replied simply, and Perseus seemed to relax marginally. “Let’s start over, I’m Jason, if you haven’t figured that out already. I’d shake your hand but it’s chained to the bed since you tried to take a chunk out of my hand.” They both laughed heartily, and Perseus’ laugh was rich and infectious. Jason swore that he could hear Leo chuckling a bit from his forge in the room next to this one, but he singled it out as a trick of the mind. Without putting much thought into it, Jason asked, “Can I call you Percy?” And suddenly the mood plunged as the angel went rigid all over, turning away to stare at the wall again.

            “No, please don’t," he said quickly. “Only my close friend called me that, and he’s…gone, I guess.” Jason knew that he was talking about Nicolas, but he didn’t dare say the name out loud.

            “I’m sorry,” Jason told him, packing in as much sincerity into his voice as he could muster. “You know, for everything.”

            “‘Sorry’ doesn’t change anything,” the angel’s voice was gruff and his tone wavered. His eyes began to water and he turned away, tears silently streaking down his face. Jason got the hint that his presence was no longer wanted and slowly rose to his feet. Perseus didn’t even look up at him, his green eyes as dull as dying stars and his gaze distant. Jason gave him a sympathetic look that he didn’t seem to notice and walked out, careful to lock the door behind him.

            Perseus was miserable here; angels, even when fallen, were free creatures. It was like keeping a horse cooped up in your living room. Jason had begged Luke to unchain the poor messenger angel, but his pleas reached dead ears. Luke insisted that Perseus was docile and harmless only when restrained, and it didn’t seem like he would be coming off that bed in a long time. Jason wondered if Luke planned to experiment on him, as if Perseus were some sort of guinea pig. The Golden Swords certainly had no intention to release the angel, but what exactly were they going to do with him? _You said that you wouldn’t associate with him, that you would let him go as soon as he’s healed. Well, he’s healed and he’s certainly not going to be free any time soon,_ Jason thought bitterly, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. Perhaps this had all been a mistake?

            He walked through the meeting room, eyeing the white angel wings that were no longer the most dazzling wings he’d ever seen. In fact, they seemed insignificant compared to Perseus’ wings, and if they sold them they certainly wouldn’t fetch as high of a price as the messenger angel’s did. The memory of selling them resurfaced and Jason desperately tried to shove it down, unwilling to face the guilt and remorse. But it kept coming back, nagging at the back of his mind like a persistent fly that just wouldn’t give up. As Jason walked through the dim hallways towards his living quarters, he finally allowed the recollection to replay itself.

 

\----Ω----

 

            _The night was cold and crisp and the full moon cast a hazy white-blue glow on the city. Shadowy silhouettes of people slipped in and out of the darkness, their footsteps but tiny disturbances in the night. Jason looked around warily, his face shadowed by the hood of his jacket. He had shed his golden masquerade mask and it was now safely tucked in one of the drawers in his dresser, since he had been able to drop it off after carefully carrying Perseus back to the facility._

_His blue eyes reflected the dim light of the street lamps, sparkling like sunlight on water. He carried a grey blanket in his hands, clutching it close to his chest as if his life depended on it. The gleam of knives could be seen under his jacket and a holster was also visible, and as a result nobody, not even inner city mobsters, dared to confront him or attempt to steal the load in his arms. If you haven’t figured it out, the blanket held the most beautiful wings that the Golden Swords had ever seen. It looked as if he was carrying two surfboards in a huge tarp. A few black feathers poked out from under the grey fabric and Jason quickly hid them from any prying or curious eyes._

_A black cat scampered across the street and Jason bit his lip; he knew that bad omens were extra horrible on a day like this. He knew he shouldn’t be venturing down this road. He knew he shouldn’t even be going_ near _the Whisper in general. No one decent ever went there, but then again he hunted angels for a living; he wasn’t necessarily decent on any standards._

_The streets became deserted, not that they weren’t deserted before, but the gangsters and Candymen preferred to lurk around the inhabited areas of the city, which is closer to the middle. The people who actually had lives and money lived in the center, amongst the glittering glass buildings and sleek cars, while every other lowlife made their homes in the outer reaches. The Whisper was the farthest place from the heart of the city that Jason frequented. As the streets branched off of it, the buildings became more and more ravaged, straight out of those movies about the apocalypse. Cracks like jagged forks of lightning riddled the sidewalks and street, making the road bumpy and uneven. All of the lamps were broken now, and Jason was only able to see with his superior, angel blood-induced eyesight._

_He suppressed a shiver. He’d never been to the Whisper with his comrades and he always had to brave it alone, but no matter how many times he went there to sell wings it always sent chills racing up and down his spine. He always felt as if a pair of eyes was watching him from the darkness, sending the hairs on the back of his neck prickling. Jason’s strides became longer as he wished to get out of the night where he was exposed, even if it meant taking refuge in the Whisper._

_He turned onto Hallow Song Avenue and scanned each of the crumbling buildings in search or the Whisper. All the paint was chipped and peeling off of these buildings, which were once apartments. Their windows were cracked, splintered, or missing. Graffiti tattooed their sides with fading colors and the fire escapes were twisted and malformed, as if they’d been liquefied by flamethrowers. When it came to this neighborhood, Jason wouldn’t be surprised if some thugs had actually used flamethrowers to melt them down._

_That’s when he saw it. This structure was much larger than the others, more warehouse-like than apartment building-like. All of the windows were covered by black tarps and the faded bricks were beginning to crack and crumble. There used to be a sign over the doorway, but the letters had long since faded and peeled off. Faint music could be heard reverberating through the building, the throb of the bass pulsing like a heartbeat that pounded in Jason’s ears, joining the rhythm of his own. ._

_He hugged his package closer to his chest and scaled the three small steps. There was no jumper or security guard to inspect him and grant him entry, since in the Whisper there were no rules, or laws for that matter. Last time Jason had been there he’d heard that a man had been stabbed at the bar for having too much to drink, even though in the Whisper it was explicitly legal to be intoxicated. With a deep breath his hand hovered over the door handle, wondering if he should just give up on the whole thing and go back to the facility, maybe even sew Perseus’ wings back onto his back. But he knew that he couldn’t do that. If the debt was to be repaid, he’d need to sell them, here and now._

_Shakily, he pushed the door open and slipped inside. The music crashed down upon him like a tsunami, roaring in his eardrums like an angry animal and shrieking through the large amps that were vibrating with the intensity. Throngs of people thrashed and swayed among a huge dance floor, their bodies mashing together like the waves of a violent sea. Lights flashed and pulsed with the tempo of the music, illuminating the crowd in an array of rainbow colors._

_A huge bar stood off to the side, stacked with drinks and bottles of all shapes and sizes that reflected the multicolored lightning. Many people sat perched on stools, laughing and calling for more drinks. Others milled about the crowd on the dance floor, coaxing people to the edge of the throng for a silent exchange of drugs and money. Jason shivered and felt his heart roaring in his chest to the point where he thought it would grow legs and run away._

_He slipped through the crowd silently, hoping not to be seen, but sadly that wasn’t the case. He was just about to sneak through a door when a young woman cornered him. She was wearing very tight blue booty shorts and a loose T-shirt with a neckline that would make Belladonna seem tame. She batted her eyelashes and puckered her lips, which were coated with a glossy red lipstick._

_“Hey, pretty boy,” she said in a smooth, seductive voice. “What brings you here?” Jason grit his teeth and tried to push past her, but she blocked his way, demanding attention. “You don’t talk much, do you? I’ll tell you a secret,” she leaned in so that her lips was a fraction of a centimeter away from his ear, “I like boys like that. Wanna take this to the bathroom and we can…talk a little more in private?” She basically draped herself over him and he made a sound of disgust, shoving her away gently but firmly._

_“Not now,” he hissed and she huffed and stalked off into the crowd for anyone interested. Jason shivered and clutched the wings even closer to his chest, making sure they were still there. With a growl he slipped into the room, closing the door behind him and locking it. It was a small spare room, with a table off to one side and painted a bland green color. The hardwood floor creaked and groaned under Jason’s weight as he shifted from one foot to another, putting his ear against the door to make sure that there was nobody listening on the other side to overhear the conversation._

_He turned to see another woman, this time even more beautiful. Her hair was a very dark chestnut, tumbling over one shoulder, and her lips were coated in black lipstick. She was wearing a very form-fitting black dress that matched her pitiless black eyes that sparkled with intelligence. She didn’t seem like a prostitute, though, and she didn’t show the slightest interest in Jason, for she was his client. His contact, though he could never be sure; this could be an angel for all he knew, and she could kill him. But he didn’t see any wings, and if she was disguising them she was doing it very well._

_“Let me see the wings. I hear they are more beautiful than normal wings by tenfold,” she said and joined him by the table as he set the blanket down. With a flick of his wrist it unrolled, revealing the two sleek black wings. Some of the feathers were rumpled, but nothing that wasn’t fixable. The woman sucked in a breath. “They’re even more beautiful than I had imagined.” She was right, the wings glittered in the dim lighting, each black feather gleaming like a dying star. They were huge and had to be tilted on an angle in order to stay on the table, and even then the ends were hanging off either side. Jason tried not to think of the deed that had to be done in order to acquire them, but it kept nagging at his mind like an insistent bug._

_“I’ll give you four million for them,” she declared, her eyes still wide with awe. Jason caught a glimpse of her back, since the dress was backless, and nearly gasped when he saw the all-too-realistic tattoo of bat wings peeking out from under the black fabric. His heart was stuttering in his chest; four_ million _dollars? That was more than he’d ever asked for, much less had his client offer. If only he could wheedle a little more out of her; then his debt would be paid off._

_“Six,” Jason asked through gritted teeth, trying to keep the waver out of his voice. If he’d asked anyone else for such a price they would’ve shot him for his audacity. It was always a hassle when it came to selling wings, but he needed at least six million to pay off his debt, and he wasn’t budging. Despite his encounters in the past, the woman didn’t pull a weapon but rather nodded in consideration, though she whistled a bit at the offer._

_“Four and a half million,” she suggested, crossing her arms and ogling dreamily at the gorgeous wings._

_“No can do. These are the biggest wings that I have ever sold and they are the only black wings known to exist as far as I know. They’re still six million,” Jason insisted and set his jaw stubbornly._

_“I can do five million,” she offered, chewing on her lip. He knew that she didn’t want to lose these wings, and even if she had to reluctantly pay six million, she would get them no matter what. Jason saw it in the hungry gleam in her eyes, and he just had to ease her into her decision._

_“Six million. Not a penny lower,” he stated firmly. “I could take them away and sell to someone else who is willing to pay my price…”_

_“No!” she cried quickly and then composed herself. “Fine, six million.” She fished out a checkbook and filled it out, handing it to me. Six million dollars. All on a single slip of paper. I knew it could be fraud; you should never accept checks from customers in this area, but it wasn’t like she had six million dollars in cash on her, so he cut her some slack. He hoped he wouldn’t regret that decision._

_“It was a pleasure doing business with you,” he said with a shake and left the wings on the table for the woman to collect. He tucked the check deep into his pocket and a smile tugged that the corner of his lips. At long last he was finally free, free of debt. Many more angels would still be able to fly unrestricted in the skies, and no others would ever have to be anchored to the ground because of Jason’s deeds._

_It was a pretty damn good day._


	7. The Consort's Tales

            Archangel Michael was panicking. A lot. He paced back and forth anxiously as he awaited the return of his messenger. He gazed at the stained-glass windows and saw the light filtering through them dimming, signaling the impending sunset. Where was he? His breathing was ragged and he clenched and unclenched his fists. Was this sort of some practical joke? Because it wasn’t at all funny, just like how Perseus had once placed a whoopee-cushion on his throne, which he’d sat on during a very important conference with his brothers. It’d been mortifying.

            “He’s supposed to be here by now,” the Archangel muttered to himself. What had happened to his messenger? Had he gotten hurt? Did one of his flight feathers choose to molt at the last second, causing him to have to walk all the way back? Then again, Perseus had told him he’d be out looking for the one who chopped off Nicolas’ wings. He’d been obsessing over that for the past four years. Had he finally found the culprit? But something told Michael that it wasn’t a good thing that his messenger angel wasn’t home before dark. His nerves were overpowering him as he held the single blue rose in his hand.

            After millennia working with the messenger angel, Michael had finally mustered the nerve to announce the beginning of his courting of the green-eyed angel. Sure, he was an Archangel and never once had Archangels even considered courting, much less taking a mate. He was pretty sure about his decision, though, and he was worried that if Perseus didn’t get back soon he’d completely chicken out. Then it would take another couple millennia for him to get back the courage to ask, and he _really_ didn’t want to do that. He thought of the angel’s soft, crooked smile, the way his green eyes glowed when he talked about something he was enthusiastic about (the color blue, for instance), and his constant and never-ceasing case of bedhead. It made his heart palpitate, if only a little.

            Sure, he was an Archangel and not that bad looking, but what if Percy allowed Michael to court him only because of his status? What if he was afraid of refusing? Michael hoped that that wasn’t the vibe he’d given out to the angel for these past centuries. His pacing became even more ferocious, and he worried his bottom lip in between his teeth, uncaring of the deep gauges he left in the soft flesh. The window of opportunity was slowly closing the later it got, because A) Percy may not show up, and this incredibly important question was something that was supposed to be asked in person and B) Michael’s nosy handmaiden, Zoë, and his advisor, Chiron would come snooping around eventually when they didn’t find the Archangel in his office, where he retreated during the night hours to work. He remembered the conversation he’d had with Zoë about a week after he began to get butterflies in his stomach whenever Percy was around.

 

\----Ω----

 

 

            _“Have you ever thought of taking a mate?” Zoë asked suddenly whilst preparing him of the annual Hanukah Gala. His everyday armor had been discarded to make way for Michael’s ceremonial robes, which the angel of nature was now furiously ironing. The Archangel sat off to the side in nothing but his boxers, though that wasn't unusual around his handmaiden. He’d chosen her because she’d sworn an oath of maidenhood and therefore wouldn’t be all flirty with him and make him uncomfortable. Any other angel would’ve been discreetly showing off their wings and flaunting themselves before Michael, but not Zoë. It was one of the many things he was grateful for._

_He had to admit, he was caught off-guard by the question. “A mate?” he parroted, sounding flabbergasted even to himself. “But neither I nor my brothers have ever taken mates.”_

_“Is there some sort of law that Archangels can't take mates on Metatron’s tablets?” Zoë accused. Metatron was the Scribe of God who wrote down His every word on clay tablets, and on some occasions scrolls, which were all stored in a gigantic archive in the Fifth Heaven. Michael shook his head no, and she continued, “Maybe you could be the first. There are many angels out there, both male and female, who would be more than happy to let Michael shook his head no, and she continued, “Maybe you could be the first. There are many angels out there, both male and female, who would be more than happy to let you court them.”_

_“But why?” the Archangel asked, bewildered. “What would be the point?” Zoë snorted, shaking her head sadly and in her disbelief ironing out a wrinkle a little too ferociously._

_“Listen, Michael. I’m not really the one to talk to you about this kind of stuff, but other than Percy, I am your best friend. I know I swore an oath of maidenhood, so I wouldn’t know anything about mating and shit, but even_ I _know that you need one. A mate,” Zoë admitted, and Michael let out a huff, crossing his arms, though he wasn't really that offended._

_“And what makes you think that?” he demanded. “I’ve been coping just fine on my own. No Archangels have ever taken mates. My brothers haven’t and neither have I, which is all right by me. It’s just another person you have to impress and live up to their expectations-”_

_“You’re missing the entire point of a mate, Michael,” Zoë interrupted, something that no other angel besides his elder brothers would do, which was another thing he liked about her. “Mates aren’t people who you’re supposed to impress. Sure, maybe during courting to show what you’re capable of, but it’s perfectly okay to let your mate down. In fact, the entire point of a mate is to be relaxed and at ease around them. They’re supposed to be understanding when things like that happen. Otherwise, they aren’t a compatible mate.”_

_“You seem to know a lot on this subject,” Michael scoffed, though he couldn’t help but feel all too interested in the subject. Whenever Zoë said the word “mate”, his thoughts immediately went to Percy, which made him feel a bit guilty. Percy had been the one unfortunate enough to catch the eye of an Archangel, something that’s never happened before, and Michael was unsure of whether the messenger would be okay with all of the firsts._

_“I know a lot more than you do!” the angel of nature insisted, unplugging the iron and holding the robe up to Michael, who nodded to show his affirmation. As she helped the Archangel into his outfit, she continued to speak, “You spend all day working, Michael. You go days without sleep just because you can, and you just work and work and work. It’s not even like you have anything to work on! Uriel and Raphael ask all the time if you’d like them to shoulder some of your responsibilities, but you horde them all for yourself. The statue that’s going to be erected in honor of those who fell during the Wars in Heaven? Thy can easily handle that. The patrol schedules? That’s right up their alley! Just because you’re the second-in-command next to the Creator Himself doesn’t mean you have to shoulder all of these burdens.”_

_Michael shoulders slumped, and he frowned, the action scrunching up his entire face. “And what’s a mate going to do to help with that issue? It’s not like they can take on an Archangel’s responsibilities.”_

_“No, they can’t, but they can help you,” Zoë stated firmly. “Don’t get me wrong, Chiron’s a great advisor and all, but what about someone whose opinions you truly take to heart? Someone who thinks not only for the good of Heaven but also for your own good? Someone who looks out for you and you do likewise?”_

_“Nobody would want to work with a mate like me. They don’t_ have to. _They have all the riches and status in the world once they’re mated to an Archangel. It’s not like they’d mate with me for anything else.” Michael’s words turned bitter, and his jaw clenched as he refused to meet Zoë’s gaze. His wings fluttered with his agitation, despite the angel of nature smoothing the puffed up feathers down in an attempt to comfort._

_“But a true mate wouldn’t do that. They’d mate with you because you’re you, not because you’re an Archangel or because you’re pretty. A true mate would be happy to help,” Zoë chided. “And with a mate, you’ll be more motivated to get your work done and you’d never stay out late; you’d have a warm bed to return to every night. Maybe this huge palace would start to feel more like a home. You’d have kisses and cuddles and preening each other and maybe even a little fucking-”_

_“Enough!” Michael snapped, but there was no force behind it. Instead, he just sounded tired. “I don’t even have a partner for the Gala. How am I supposed to find a mate?” Zoë had just finished fastening his robes and with that he whisked out the door, ignoring the angel of nature’s pitying look. He tried not to imagine getting back from his office to see Percy waiting in his bed._

\----Ω----

 

            It wasn't like gender was a hindrance. If Percy really, really was uncomfortable with Michael appearing as male, he could undoubtedly change into a female form, despite the fact that he was a bit nervous about being on the receiving end of their…copulating. He could look however Percy wanted him to look, and the Archangel was willing to bend over backwards to make sure that the messenger wanted him as a mate. If he wanted Michael to be in female form so they could bear fledglings, he would do it. If the green-eyed angel wanted the meals to be more special than if they came from a personal chef, Michael would learn how to cook all by himself. He would learn to make the food blue because that's what Percy liked. He’d do anything, really, as long as the black-feathered angel accepted him.

            It was taking a really, really long time for Percy to come back, and Michael knew that his time had passed. He wasn't disheartened like he thought he’d be, however; he was only more determined to find out why he was absent. He’d transferred from hopeless romantic to stern Archangel whose messenger was incredibly tardy, though he didn’t think he could yell at or exact any punishment upon his messenger.

            Archangel Michael was not one to spy, and he hated sending what were called Iris messages, for fear he’d show up in some intimate moment in someone else’s life, curse that stupid angel of nature for inventing the damn things, but if Perseus was goofing off and not getting his sorry arse over here, Michael would have to reprimand him. His messenger angel did tend to get sidetracked, but he knew the rule to be back by dark and wouldn’t dilly-dally if he was running late. Hesitantly, Michael walked over to one of the fountains of Holy Water and set one of his fingers aflame. It didn’t hurt, only tickled slightly as he pressed the fire into the fountain. “Show me Perseus the messenger angel,” he ordered. “Make it one-way.” When it came to angels, you didn’t have to know the location of another angel to Iris message them, just their name and occupation.

            Immediately a spray of water rocketed into the air and formed an image. At first the water droplets made it fuzzy, making the Archangel’s eyes hurt, but eventually the picture focused and sharpened. He wished it hadn’t. Perseus was laying on his back, hands chained to the uncomfortable, lumpy-looking bed he was laying on. Silent tears streaked down his face and his shoulders shook as he held in sobs. An urge to protect surged within Michael, one that would be so much more potent had Michael just mustered the courage to ask Percy to be his mate, but the fury that came along with the protectiveness had to be shoved down, lest it cloud his senses. Now that the anger was out of the way, a wave of sorrow crashed into him as he regarded the ragged stumps where the angel’s beautiful, powerful black wings once had been. He’d spent much of his time admiring those gorgeous wings from afar, and even though the angel seemed to be bandaged up, there was still no explanation for why he was chained and his wings were missing. He extended his superior senses and found that he was unable to locate the messenger’s exact location. Normally, Archangel could find anything and anyone, but Michael crashed into a wall as a result of his many attempts to locate the shine and power of Percy’s angelic soul.

            The messenger continued to cry, and Michael couldn’t bear to just stand by and watch for any longer. For a few moments he just stared forlornly at his messenger, wishing that he’d made the Iris message two-way (Later he found himself unable to create a two-way Iris message), and then slowly cut his hand through the Iris message, lowering his gaze to the ground. A single tear found its way down his cheek and dripped onto the floor. He would’ve tried to speak with him, would’ve forced his Iris message through and announced that even if he was fallen he would begin his courting of him once he was found, reassured him that he was still watching over him and keeping him safe, but he could do none of those things. The Creator’s laws still applied to him, and he couldn’t associate with the fallen. Even a fallen who had been an intended mate. If he did, his own brother, no matter how reluctantly, would have to saw off his wings and cast him down to Earth, where he would have to live amongst mortals, powerless. Uriel wouldn’t want to exile him, but it was his job, and if he didn’t uphold it he’d fall, too. No matter how raw and unwaveringly Michael felt for Percy, he didn’t want to end up like his eldest brother. Like Lucifer.

            He staggered a bit at the reality, his gaze distant. Feelings aside, Perseus had been the best messenger angel in all of time. He was quick, agile, and fast on those black wings of his. He had been beyond loyal, honor bound beyond belief. He wouldn’t’ve let Archangel Michael down for the world. He was always on time and worked himself hard in order to get the job done, unlike no other messenger angel that had ever existed. It was why Michael had chosen him that fateful day, when a headstrong, blue-eyed, brown-haired messenger angel and a humorous black haired, green-eyed angel of nature had brought their son to demonstrate his skills to apply for the role as an Archangel’s messenger. Now he was anchored to the ground, just like Nicholas, destined to walk on foot or drive in one of those wretched metal beasts that the mortals had created. No more flying. No more anything.

            His legs acted of their own accord, and he was so lost in his thoughts that he only realized he was walking down the hallway towards Perseus’ room until he was halfway there. He let his feet carry him there, for they knew the way by heart, and the blue rose in his hand was getting abused by the clench of his fist. He couldn’t find it in him to care as the flower withered with the Archangel’s sadness. His mind wandered to all of the memories he and Perseus had shared, and yet another tear fell as he stopped outside of the messenger angel’s room, the door slightly ajar and looking so unsuspecting, completely unlike what Michael expected the door to a missing person’s room to look like. He stepped over the threshold before he could stop himself, and he couldn’t help but take it all in. It was painted blue, obviously, and all of his belongings lay dormant, still and serene exactly where Percy had left them. His bed was unmade and covered in black feathers, which would’ve made anyone think that he was out on a stroll and not gone forever.

            Michael looked around and the wanting, the longing for his messenger angel to bound inside with a scroll in hand, was overpowering. He wanted to see Perseus smile, just one last time. He wanted to see those beautiful green eyes shining with happiness and not dripping with tears of loss and self-hatred. Then he noticed a note on the dresser that was carefully folded and tied with a red ribbon. He knew he shouldn’t read it, for it could’ve been a love letter written by him or a kind, gentle female seraph, and the thought made the Archangel turn all the more bitter. Even so, it may have a lead on where he went, and Michael took it gingerly in his hands, untying the ribbon and opening the note. It read:

 

_Dear ~~Lord Michael~~ Admiral Asshole,_

_If you’re reading this you’re probably worried sick and want my head on a platter for being tardy, but I have a good lead. I think I know who the person(s) is that’s taking the angels’ wings, and I may be gone for a few days. I’m terribly sorry and guilty that I will be technically letting you down in order to go off on my own adventure that may even lead to a dead end, but I’m pretty sure that I’ve found the culprit. It’s a good thing I found them before they found me. I’ll be back soon, I promise._

_-Private Perseus_

            Michael wiped furiously at his eyes and tucked the note into is armor. Perseus’ promise would never be fulfilled, for he was never coming home. He would cherish the note forever, read it over and over until he’d memorized it, and then read it some more. He’d run his hand over Perseus’ sloppy yet endearing handwriting more than once, for he couldn’t admit that Percy hadn’t left a huge hole in his heart, and the missing chunk was now anchored to Earth along with him. He knelt by the bed, still gripping the dead rose tightly in his fist, and it soon perked up and bloomed, its color returning like it’d been before, but only because the Archangel had willed it, not because he was happy.

            “Perseus, son of Sally and Poseidon and messenger angel,” his voice cracked as he lay the rose down on the bed, nestling it in amongst the black feathers there. “I formally ask to,” a shaky inhale, “court you. You may accept for decline my…my…affections, but I am hoping you will find me to be a suitable,” a small sob, “ _mate_ and we may live out the rest of…our days t-together.”

            Michael wept.

 

\----Ω----

 

            “Alright, angel boy, you need some breakfast and some exercise,” the mortal named Luke announced gruffly. Though he was unwilling to encounter the other humans in this facility, Perseus had to admit that he was excited to be able to walk around, for there was a kink in his neck that he just couldn’t get rid of, and all of his muscles were tight from disuse. He allowed Luke to unchain him without biting a chunk out of his arm (he’d become more comfortable with the humans since he first woke up here), but was disappointed when a set of handcuffs was placed onto his wrists, along with a blindfold on top of that. He felt the cold barrel of a gun between his shoulder blades and walked in the direction that the human escorted him, unwilling to enter the Healing Slumber again.

            Perseus was not at all fond of Luke, preferring Jason out of all of the people who lived in the facility. The powerful aroma of angel blood clung to the sandy-haired mortal wherever he went, as if he drank it daily, which was disgusting beyond compare. The thought of Luke ingesting the blood of his brothers and sisters like some sort of demon creature made him want to heave, though he wouldn’t’ve put it past Luke in the first place. All he saw was white fabric as he was escorted down the halls, and he stepped cautiously, as if there was a deep chasm in front of him that he was walking right into.

            “Keep it moving,” the human ordered and jabbed the gun even harder into his back, causing slight pain to flare up in the stumps that were once his wings. The area was now beyond a pressure point, it was practically an Achilles heel, especially the small of his back, which just so happened to be where Luke was jamming his gun. He gritted his teeth through the pain, making well sure that the human didn’t know that he was bothered, and soldiered on, though he wasn’t planning on making it easy for Luke.

            “Well you’re a charmer,” Perseus scoffed.

“And you’re an angel,” the human replied matter-of-factly, his voice holding this simplicity that made it sound like that was the worst thing in the world. “Or, you _were._ ” Talk about a low blow. Perseus used to be unable to even _think_ about what he once was without bursting into tears, but now this numbness had settled over him, a cold acceptance that also came with the feeling that made him want to kill every human in this facility, even Jason. Every time he looked at the blue-eyed boy only served as a reminder of what he’d lost, and Luke’s words were like a knife twisting in his gut.

            “Whatever,” he replied, feigning nonchalance and unable to come up with a proper comeback. The humility of it made his ears turn pink, but he could only pray that Luke hadn’t picked up on his uneasiness. Since he couldn’t see the human’s face, the angel was unsure of whether he was cross, amused, or even both. Luke placed a large hand on Perseus’ shoulder and steered him to the left, and immediately afterwards he gave a violent jerk to fling the hand off, ignoring the dark chuckle from behind him. The angel had completely forgotten that he should’ve been mapping out how many paces he took before he was turned right or left. It was a lost cause now, since he’d waited too long.

            “Don’t try anything or I sent a bullet through your head. How’d you like another coma?” the human snarled threateningly and Perseus stayed put as he heard the sound of a door opening. “Inside. Now.” The cold air slammed into the angel like a wave, and he shivered; after all, he was only wearing jeans. He didn’t have socks or a shirt, and the frigid air nipped at his bare skin and caused his hairs to stand on end. The blindfold was removed rather roughly, as were his handcuffs. Perseus brushed himself off indignantly, as if he were trying to get rid of the human taint that had been left on his body when Luke had touched him.

            “Sit,” the mortal ordered and hustled him to a table in the corner of the room, farthest from the door. Perseus considered breaking his neck and making a run for it; just because he was fallen and without powers didn’t mean he didn’t have superhuman speed and strength. Then again, Luke had the gun, and the messenger didn’t want to risk the repercussions for attacking. He also had no idea to get out, considering he hadn’t paid attention to the hallways when he was blindfolded. So, grudgingly, he sat. There were other tables as well, but these were placed farther away from his table. Rude.

            Luke chained Perseus to the leg of the table, and Perseus knew that, even though he could easily drag the table behind him, it would be a gigantic hindrance to his escape. Luke left for a few moments, and in that time Perseus sat quietly and tried to find the best means of exodus, though it may not be on as grad of a scale as Moses’. After a short while (he must’ve been rushing, unwilling to leave the angel alone), Luke returned, and he seemed surprised to see that Perseus was still sitting there, waiting patiently. Scowling, the human placed a plate full of food in front of him, and after giving Perseus a wary look he stalked over to the other tables. That’s when the door opened again and more people filed in. Perseus recognized a select few of them.

            Jason and the little imp creature, Leo, were chatting animatedly, though their conversation immediately ceased, along with everyone else’s, when they walked in to see Perseus sitting all by his lonesome. Just to be a little shit, he gave a sarcastic wave, ignoring the furious glare from Luke. There was Reyna, who’d introduced herself a day or two earlier and had talked with him, though it was more like an interrogation. He easily dodged all of her invasive questions that either hit a little too close to home personally or would be an act of treason against Heaven if he answered them. She was polite but left with a slight crinkle in her brow, having not gained any more ground tan before she’d talked to him. Perseus liked to know that he was making these humans’ lives a living Hell.

            Two other people, Gwendolyn and Dakota, walked in, with Dakota chugging from a flask in an unhealthy manner and Gwen looking on worriedly. He didn’t care for them, and was about to assess his food when another human walked in, bringing up the rear and closing the door behind her. His mouth dropped open. She was pretty, no, she was _gorgeous_. Her hair tumbled over one shoulder in a cascade of honey blond curls, and it was completely natural, judging by the look of it. Her sharp grey eyes scanned the room and Perseus got lost in how much depth and intelligence lay within the shifting layers that gleamed in the florescent light. Her face was perfect, neither blemish nor freckle speckling her skin, and she had the perfect tan despite the cold weather. Perseus was surprised that she was an angel hunter and not an angel; he had only seen angels with such perfection before.

            Her gaze locked with his and he felt his cheeks heat up. He quickly looked away and concentrated on his food. He was an angel. He could not fall in love with a mortal girl or risk toppling into Hell. _But you’re not an angel. You’re a fallen angel. You don’t have to go by the rules anymore,_ a voice in his head chided. He ignored it. He refused to become smitten for a rotten human girl, especially when she was an angel hunter. She was probably responsible for the disappearances of many of Perseus’ friends. She had turned to a life of sin.

            But he couldn’t help but turn around to look at her as she sat at the tables, starting small talk with Luke and the others. They were nice enough, he supposed; the only one who seemed to have a chip on his shoulder was Luke. Then again, Perseus didn’t know whether the girl hated him or not. She seemed like the girl in a mortal school who the crowd would part for as she barged passed. She didn’t show fear, she was meant to be feared. She was also obviously the leader of the entire group of angel hunters. Her posture was erect and she had a sort of responsible and intelligent aura emitting from her. That was all the more of a reason to not fall in love with her.

            Dakota hadn’t been very decent, but then again he had been extraordinarily intoxicated when he had first entered Perseus’ cell. His face had been flushed and his eyes were bloodshot and unfocused. He had waved a wine bottle at the angel and made a few very rude and childish gestures, then had left. At the time Perseus had been confused, but he eventually suspected that he was an alcoholic, and a dedicated one at that. Even now as he watched the angel hunter he saw his eyes were half-closed and he was grinning like a madman while joking with Gwendolyn.

            Speaking of Gwendolyn, she had been a very nice girl. She wasn’t that into angel hunting and preferred to stay at the facility to organize the others’ trophies and check Leo’s traps, which was at least slightly more decent than everyone else. They had talked for a brief moment, but Perseus could see her discomfort as she spoke, as if it was an offense to be speaking with an angel, and a fallen one at that. He was able to figure out that she was strong and independent, but also mildly timid, at least around him. She kept casting glances back at him, which made him feel like he was under a magnifying lens, and kept quiet, preferring to listen rather than speak.

            Leo was a genius, and Perseus couldn’t deny that. That braniac gleam in the boy’s eyes was all the fallen angel could focus on when the human had come to give him lunch. There was also a hint of mischief mixed in with the intelligence that drove Perseus mad; it was as if he was taunting him, his eyes clearly stating, “I know something you don’t know.” Leo had been friendly and happy to engage in conversation with the angel, talking about mechanics and other things. Perseus was not that into mechanics, but he was an angel; he was required to study up on every aspect of culture, academics, and professions, and knew a great deal when it came to tinkering with spare parts, something that Leo clearly did a lot of.

            Then there was Jason. He was the one who usually brought Perseus’ meals and he made an effort to make sure he was comfortable, even sneaking a blanket into his cell. He was humble and had plenty of remorse, which the angel was proud of. He did anything and everything in order to repent, to make it up to Perseus, though the angel had no idea what was going to make up for the loss of his wings. Jason was a pretty decent person at heart, but the lure of money to pay off his debt had led him astray. He was kind, loyal, and honest to a fault, not to mention sickeningly optimistic. His presence could be tiresome at times, even though it was supposed to lift Perseus spirits, but he couldn’t deny that he enjoyed the human’s company. It was always nice to have someone to talk to who didn’t give you odd glances and made snide remarks.

            He was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t notice someone had pulled out a chair next to him and had sat down. When he looked up, he saw the blonde girl he’d been admiring beforehand, in all of her grey-eyed glory. His heart skipped a beat and Perseus scolded himself for it, even though it wasn’t technically against the rules for a fallen angel to love a mortal. If he let himself fall head-over-heels for her, it would be an all-time low. Any chance of earning his wings back and becoming a messenger angel again would be crushed and that’s what he wanted most in the world; to be able to go home.

            He gulped and looked down at his plate, pushing his food around with his fork. She said nothing, just watched him. Her grey eyes bore a hold into the side of his face and he couldn’t help but shiver a little. Finally he said hesitantly, “Hey,” just to fill the uncomfortable silence. There was a pause.

            “Hello,” she replied, her tone guarded. Perseus chewed on his lip and still didn’t make eye contact with her, but he could still feel her chilly gaze scanning him as if he were an interesting specimen she was raring to dissect. He hoped that he wouldn’t be dissected. Who knew how far human curiosity could go? “So you’re adjusting?”

            “Slowly, but yes,” Perseus replied, and rather curtly at that. He hated talking about how he was basically a prisoner in the stupid facility. It pained him to think about life not long ago, where he could fly free and deliver messages for Archangel Michael without a care in the world.

            “How was it like?” she asked suddenly, her voice sounding rather distant.

            “To what?” the angel questioned and finally mustered up the courage to meet her gaze. Her expression was rather distracted, but she immediately shook her head and managed to focus.

            “To fly,” she answered matter-of-factly, as if it’d been obvious. The other angel hunters had stopped what they were doing to watch the whole thing unfold from their table in the middle of the room, and Perseus could hear them whispering amongst themselves in hushed voices, trying to overhear the conversation. They knew it was rude, but Perseus could see the curiosity sparkling in their eyes. Even Luke seemed mildly interested, and it made goosebumps crop up on his arms at the intense scrutiny.

            “It was…good,” the fallen angel slowly. The girl seemed to become annoyed, her brows knitting together and her mouth turned down at the corners. A part of Perseus didn’t want to make the girl upset. He felt guilty that he had let her down, and had he still had his wings, they would’ve flattened in apology. Before that, however, they would’ve been raised up and out in a flirtatious gesture, trying to lure a potential mate in.

            “No, in more detail,” she insisted, but it sounded more like an order rather than a request.

            “It was amazing, okay?” Perseus snapped, “I was able to feel free. Soar above the clouds and feel the wind on my face and ruffling my hair. My wings…God, my wings could carry me anywhere. They were powerful and reliable and I could always trust them to take me where I wished. They were everything, they were what made me happy and were a part of me,” his voice cracked, “and now they’re gone.”

            There was silence. Someone could hear a pin drop as the angel hunters stared at Perseus with awe and guilt written all over their faces. The blonde girl, Luke, and Reyna however looked indifferent, their faces like the masquerade masks they wore when they hunted angels. Perseus quickly returned his concentration back to his food, which lay uneaten. He didn’t seem to have much of an appetite anymore now that he had confessed.

            “I think it’s time to go,” Luke growled, and with that he blindfolded the angel, handcuffed him, and dragged him out of the dining hall. He didn’t even learn the girl’s name.


	8. Burning Bridges

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter was a little short, but I promise the next chapter will make up for it.

            Jason had finally convinced Luke to unchain Perseus, after two long and agonizing days of schmoozing and begging. The trainer had reluctantly asked for all the member of the Golden Swords’ vote, and it was won four to three in favor of letting the angel roam around his quarters, rather than being chained to the bed. Luke, Annabeth, and Gwen had opposed. Jason knew that Perseus had feelings for Annabeth, even though she remained blissfully unaware of this fact; he’d seen how his gaze lingered on her whenever they ate together, or how he’d talk constantly about her after she’d brought in his food tray. Whether those feelings were positive or negative was a mystery, because his words never hinted on hatred or love.

_“She’s nice.”_

_“A little lost in her thoughts, but at least he treats me like a person.”_

_“It was like I was under a magnifying glass.”_

_“She’s pretty, but like a big cat. She looks like she wants to dissect me or something.”_

             Jason was getting mixed signals, like a traffic light turning red and green at the same time. It left the human confused, and he was determined to find out, though he really didn’t want to make the angel seem uncomfortable. Something was definitely going on in that immortal’s mind, something that was far beyond any mortal’s comprehension. It was amazing and frustrating at the same time. Jason pondered this as he walked down the hallway, whistling, and carrying Perseus’ breakfast in his hands. He passed the forge, the other members’ living quarters, and finally walking over to the metal door that cut Perseus’ cell off from the rest of the facility.

            The angel was waiting for him expectantly, still unaware that he had been given freedom. He was lying across the bed, plucking at his shackle nonchalantly (the other three had been removed, leaving one on his wrist) and grinning lopsidedly when Jason arrived, though the human felt slightly concerned as the angel eyed the cereal in his arms ravenously. It was like watching a fox in a chicken coup. He arched his back and stretched, causing his joints to pop, and Jason couldn’t help be jealous at his toned stomach and shoulders, though he tried to ignore the ragged wing stumps that looked as if they were glued onto his shoulder blades.

“Breakfast,” he announced and the angel propped his head up on his hand, his smile showing off his dimples. Jason couldn’t help but chuckle; the two had come to the point where they would consider each other friends, or at least acquaintances, though there was still a wall in between them with “ _Perseus’ wings_ ” written on it.

            “I have something special for you today, but you have to promise to be on your best behavior,” Jason told him, setting the tray down on the small coffee table that’d been lugged in there earlier.

“So what, I’m your dog now? If I sit and stay I’ll get a treat?” the angel snorted, but his eyes twinkled with amusement, and it was clear that he’d perked up at the mention of a surprise, which he only did when he was interested (a rare occurrence). The angel had the attention span of a chameleon; it was so obvious that he wasn’t paying attention to you that he might as well have eyes that moved in two separate directions.

            “Is it _blue cookies?_ ” he asked excitedly, the tone of his voice becoming increasingly curious, and he tried to consider the cereal from all angles as if there were blue cookies somehow hidden from his sight. Jason laughed heartily at the angel’s enthusiasm. All it took was one cookie that’d been dyed blue and Perseus had become obsessed with them, insisting that his food be blue when it was possible. Jason had been a little weirded-out by the messenger angel’s sudden blue fetish, but eventually he found out that it was uncommon to have any sort of colored food in Heaven. No wonder Perseus had been eager to get his hands on them.

            “Even though cookies would be great, I have something even better,” the human replied with a grin, but it bled into seriousness as he regarded the celestial being critically. “But you have to swear that you will act like, well, an angel. _Best behavior_. No ruses or violence or anything like that, you hear?” Perseus shoved his nose in the air and scoffed, as if he were offended that Jason was doubting his ability to be conducted. It was obviously a joke; Perseus knew and was even proud of the fact that he was a rather…violent and intense individual, not to mention egotistical. But once a person got past that, it was very hard _not_ to love the stupid angel.

            “What could be better than blue cookies? But I promise I’ll be good. I swear it on my wing…stumps.” The two of them laughed at this, but Jason immediately knew something was wrong. The fallen angel’s expression was incredibly pained, even as he laughed; the smile not reaching his eyes, which were brimming with tears. His laugh was sullen and hollow, as if someone had gutted at the humor out of him. They lapsed into a very awkward and uncomfortable silence for a few moments and Jason, struggling to break the tension, finally spoke up.

            “All right, then,” he announced, a little more enthusiastically than necessary, but he was desperate to drag Perseus out of the depression that loomed like a loud around him. With much haste, Jason fumbled a bit but eventually managed to produce the key from his pocket and unlocked the shackle on Perseus’ wrist. He tossed the key and it went flying into the trashcan that lay in the corner of the room, turning to give the angel a cheeky smile. Perseus gasped and shot upright, his face lighting up like a child’s on Christmas, the previous despair having long since been forgotten. He rubbed his wrist, which had become red with irritation from the metal rubbing up against it.

            “Did you…?” he said breathlessly, beaming. His eyes were just as vibrant and energetic as they’d been when Jason had first met him; ever since his wings had been chopped off they had been duller and even lifeless at times. Now, instead of hostility and rage like they normally were filled with when he became this lively, his eyes shone and sparkled with joy and delight. He was downright ecstatic.

            “It was hard, but I convinced them,” Jason replied, unable to contain his happiness for Percy. It warmed his heart to see the angel happy for once, and perhaps he’d be able to go out on his own and leave this place behind, so full of regret and pain and past nightmares. He was so lost in his thoughts that he nearly toppled over when Perseus threw his arms around his neck and hugged him tight, managing only to stagger back a few steps to hold the messenger’s weight. Jason’s shoulder became a bit damp as Perseus murmured thank-you a thousand times over, and the mortal was surprised that he would actually be humble enough to say so. Maybe his narcissistic personality was just a façade; a cover-up to hide the sensitive and vulnerable being underneath. Suddenly aware of what he was doing, the angel quickly composed himself and his cheeks flushed a dark shade of red.

            “I’m grateful. I can’t describe how indebted I am to you,” he managed and wiped tears of happiness from his face. Jason had only just realized that he, too, had been crying. His cheeks were wet, but his grin shone like a blazing star.

            “No, it was just me paying off a debt,” Jason told him and gave a pointed look at Perseus’ wing stumps. The angel frowned for a moment, but it didn’t seem to dampen his mood. He stretched in a million different ways and cracked his neck.

            “Oh good Lord I’ve been on that bed _forever_ ,” he groaned. “And I’m immortal. I’ve got time, so if anything seems like it’s dragging, you know I’m either bored as hell or very uncomfortable. In this case it’s both,” he added. Jason chuckled and they talked for a long while about things that they’d never even mentioned. Like how Reyna’s cooking was or how the lights had the tendency to flicker every once in a while; they chatted as if they were old friends and not people who were supposed to be eternal enemies.

            “Still, though; I’m not the only one that comes in here,” Jason leaned in, his eyes narrowed. “Show me I can trust you, because I’m not sure if this is an act or what, but all I know is that this can prove who you are. This can get you out of here if you prove yourself worthy. Please. Don’t let me down. Promise.” There was this pleading in his voice, a pleading that you would only find in people who were desperate. Perseus seemed taken aback, but he nodded vigorously.

            “I…I promise,” he replied. Jason finally let his shoulders relax; knowing that Perseus would try to not kill anyone while he was free was a huge burden off of his shoulders. As he walked out of Perseus’ cell, smiling and waving goodbye, little did he know that that burden would come crashing back down on top of him, and that he would buckle and crack under its weight.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Perseus could not describe how overjoyed he was. As Jason left and locked the door, which he wasn’t that bothered by, he leaped off of the bed and ran in circles around the room, stretching his sore muscles and walking off the pins and needles that had developed in his feet. Without thinking he did a perfect backflip and landed on his feet, grinning from ear to ear. He saw the forgotten plate of food on the floor and his stomach roared loudly.

            He stooped down and drained the cereal bowl within five minutes, gulping the remaining milk down and wiping off the acquired milk mustache. His body was humming with energy and his senses were on edge. Blood roared in his ears and his heart thumped steadily like the pounding of a drum. Adrenaline rushed through his body and made his skin tingle. For the first time since his wings were severed, he felt alive.

            A few days came and went, boring the angel to death other than the blindfolded trips to the Mess Hall and visits to the lavatory to wash up and do his business. That’s when he began to feel restless, like a horse that had been cooped up in their stall for too long. He paced back and forth across his cell, his agitation spiking. What was the point of “getting unchained” and not being able to walk around by himself? He’d be perfectly okay with an escort, but he supposed that would take too much time out of the Golden Swords’ schedule.

            If he had still been chained to that bed, he would’ve gone insane by now. Frustration pulsed off of him in waves and his jaw was clenched with anger. He wanted out of his cell. He wanted to feel the cool night air on his face and not have to breathe in the stale, recycled air from inside the facility. He wanted his sun to be from the real thing and not electrical lights. He wanted to run around out in the open and not be confined to a small room. Most of all, he wanted to fly again. He knew it wouldn’t happen, but the aching coming from his wing stumps was so unbearable it drove him up a wall.

            All at once the walls became closed in, stifling and restricting. The air became suffocating and he gasped in order to take enough in. His vision tilted and his head swam, thoughts blurring together into incomprehensible gibberish. He began to hyperventilate, his pupils but tiny dots within his iris. His lungs clawed for air but just couldn’t seem to get enough, even though there was plenty to offer. He gripped his hair in his fists and screamed at the top of his lungs, watching as his vision blurred and his chest rising and falling at a horrifying pace.

            That’s when the door flew open and Luke barged inside, yelling something at him. He couldn’t understand him; his words were utterly unintelligible. Perseus’ vision was red. His mind told him that he disliked this human and he let out a sound like a snarl as he approached. He couldn’t see anything; he could only process the image of a boy running towards him and looking angry as his vision skewed at a terrifying angle. There was a shout and the human ran closer. He was attacking! Perseus scrambled to defend himself as the buff human with the scar down his face reached out his hand towards him.

            A part of the angel’s head screamed: _He’s trying to help! He’s extending his hand to help you up!_ But the other, more powerful side was chanting: _Murder! Murder! Murder!_ Perseus bellowed and lashed out at the human, overwhelmed by utter rage. He staggered back and the angel pounced slamming him to the ground. Perseus was aware of shouting, but it was of in the distance. The two struggled and rained punches on each other as they rolled on the floor, hissing, snarling, and spitting like street cats.

            Luke nailed Perseus in the chest, knocking the breath out of him, and he retaliated as he drove the human into the wall, his strength driven by vengeance and hatred. _He was trying to attack me. He deserves to die,_ the angel chanted over and over again in his head as he staggered to his feet, raising his right foot to deliver the blow that would knock the human unconscious or, hopefully, kill him. That’s when a voice cut through the rage.

            “PERSEUS!” it was a desperate cry, one full of pain and betrayal. The angel stood motionless as his foggy head cleared and his vision focused. He looked down at the beaten and bloody form of Luke Castellan at his feet and the blood, which wasn’t his, that coated his knuckles. His left eye ached and began to swell shut, and a cut on his lip dripped blood down his chin. He didn’t look nearly as bad as Luke did, though, and his wounds were already closing up.

            That’s when he saw him. Jason was standing a little farther down the hall, looking at him in horror. His mouth was moving, trying to form words, but it wouldn’t work. A single tear slipped down his cheek. Perseus looked at himself and at Luke, who was breathing raggedly and bleeding out on the floor at his feet. He had done this. What had gotten into him? What was he thinking?

            “Jason! I can explain…please-” Perseus took a few running steps towards him, but the human backed up, shaking his head.

            “No. No. Stay away from me,” Jason hissed, his voice cracking. More tears slipped down his cheeks and his blue eyes were dull with betrayal.

            “Jason-”

            “ _I said stay away_!” he screamed, drawing his gun. Perseus scrambled back, holding his arms out in a pleading gesture as he prayed for Jason to understand. Prayed for Jason to hear him up and they could go back to how they once were. “You promised! _You promised me!_ ” He was hysterical now, his voice sounding broken and tears flowing down like waterfalls, the gun shaking violently in his trembling hands, but Perseus could clearly see that the safety was off. He didn’t want to go into the Healing Slumber again, especially if the one tending to his wounds was going to be less kind than Jason.

            “Please, Jason!” Perseus wailed and crumbled to his knees, clasping his hands together in a begging gesture. “Please let me explain!” It was funny how people said that when they were caught doing something utterly horrible and merciless. Jason walked up to the angel, who was crying profusely now, his shoulders shaking as his body was racked with sobs. The human was poker-faced now, though his eyes and nose were still red and tear tracks strained his cheeks. “Please,” the angel whispered. “Just show me a little mercy and I’ll tell you everything.”

            “People like you don’t deserve mercy. I’ve shown you enough,” Jason’s voice was hard and pitiless. He raised his gun and fired twice at Perseus’ leg. He screamed and collapsed onto his side, the fresh tears not from the pain but from the fact that…whatever he and Jason had had…had deteriorated into nothing more than broken promises and bittersweet memories. Acquaintanceship? Friendship? Jason dragged Perseus, who had gone limp and was now crying silently, down a hallway that the angel had never seen before, not that he’d seen much before. He didn’t care, though; all he could feel was the crushing guilt. That’s when he heard the sound of a door opening and was tossed, rather roughly, into a room.

            The floor was hard stone. And cold. Very cold. Perseus began shivering and the blood from the quickly-closing wounds in his leg began to trickle onto the floor. He looked up just in time to see Jason closing the cell door. It was one of those classic cell doors, made up of bars, and Perseus wished that it wasn’t; he could see Jason’s tear-stained face gazing at him sorrowfully through the cold iron. “I should’ve left you on the streets,” he whispered mournfully, mostly to himself, and another tear fell. And then he was gone, and not just from bedside the cell door; just like that he had walked out of Perseus’ life forever.

            The angel curled up on the ground and wept.

 

 


	9. Slaves of Our Tears

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a warning that there is an attempt at suicide in this chapter, as well as very graphic violence.

            Perseus snarled and bared his teeth, a savage wolf on every level but physical, as Luke entered his cell, slamming the metal door behind him. The sound made the angel flinch, and he fought back the remorse and grief that constantly threatened to spill over, effectively locking it away deep inside himself. With those emotions out of the way, there was only the raw and primal rage left, the rage that angels had long since overcome since Lucifer had fallen. He hated the humans, despised them maybe even more than the Devil did. Had his chances of going back to Heaven become even slimmer if he lay waste to this land and the ones who lived there, he would’ve gladly killed every last one when he had the chance. Even so, his thoughts were lingering in the area where Lucifer’s had, when he and a third of Heaven’s angels decided that they were tired of ruling under a God who loved his mortal creations more than his angelic ones. Only this time, it wasn't fueled by jealousy. It was fueled by hatred. Absolute and unabashed hatred.

            Why hadn’t he finished the job with Luke when he had had the chance? He could’ve killed the mortal in countless creative ways. Perhaps he should’ve ripped his shoulder blades out to show just how painful it was to get your wings sawed off, or maybe he should rip off his hand and show him how badly the pins and needles had accumulated in Percy’s hand when he was lying on that stupid bed. Luke wasn’t really the main antagonist here, however. It was Jason. It was all Jason. He’d tricked Percy into thinking that they were good, that they would accept Percy for who he was and wouldn’t give a fuck about what he did when he was brought back to the headquarters. Instead, he was treated like an animal. Locked in a cage that masqueraded as a room, forced to eat slop that was as nutritional as cardboard, and be shunned by everyone in sight. Well, except by Jason, of course, but that was his ruse to get Perseus to trust. The angel would cut him down mercilessly, and he wouldn’t feel a scrap of guilt when he heard the satisfying thump of his body hitting the ground. How had Perseus ever let his guard down so easily? Perseus had let the stupid thing get close to him and bury its way into his guiltily soft heart with tears and apologies and favors only to rip it out of his chest, taking it off with him to God-knows-where.

 _But you admit that you liked him once, that you enjoyed his companionship,_ a voice chided in his head. He burned it and let it crumble into ash.

            He trusted no one in this facility, now. He would get out even if it meant he would fight tooth and nail for it. But he had to admit it, couldn’t silence the voice that kept rebuilding itself no matter how much the angel crushed, stabbed, crumbled, or burned it and shoved its remains off to the side, where it could resurface later. Part of him was still broken, the part that was so fed up and tired of all this that it refused to be vengeful; the part that was mounting Jason, his only friend that he’d left behind. Then again, the mortal probably hated him to the core now. That left him alone; alone in this forsaken, hellish world to wither and waste away like a flower in the wintertime. Perseus’ chains rattled as he trembled and his body was racked with silent sobs that he desperately tried to restrain, but he couldn’t help but let one slip from his lips in a tortured whimper.

            It was better to know that Jason hated him. It would be easier to hate back.

            “Well, well, well. What do we have here?” Luke asked, his voice full of mocking. He rubbed Perseus under the chin and the angel snarled, snapping at his hand. The force of his teeth connecting was so powerful that the sound of them gnashing together rang through the cell. “Nearly took my fingers off there,” Luke sneered, waggling all ten of the appendages just to make sure that he wasn’t mistaken. “But this isn’t going to be like the last time. I still have the scar from your teeth, you know.”

            He kicked Perseus so hard that the angel saw stars, and not in the good, erotic way. Black spots danced in his vision, and the sickening crack that came along with the kick signaled broken ribs. It would explain why his chest felt like it was on fire, and he let out a wail of agony, collapsing onto his side. The bruise that began to form was hideous and a deep purple, almost black. Perseus let out a small moan of pain, another tear dripping down his face.

            “No Jason to save you, eh? He won’t be there to protect you anymore. He’s gone; he’s not an angel hunter anymore. He’s off with his sister, living in a luxurious penthouse in a better neighborhood. The only reason he stayed was because he was taking care of you, and then you turn around and stab him in the back. ”

            Perseus’ lower lip quivered, much to his own disgust, and he screwed his eyes shut tight as if it would all disappear if he didn’t look. The angel certainly didn’t need the stupid human who severed his wings. He didn’t need to be protected or sheltered, and he certainly didn’t care if he’d betrayed the irritating mortal. But he knew that he was trying to convince himself. He cowered into the floor and tried to make himself as small as possible, less of a target. If he had his wings back they would be flattened to the floor in submission, becoming pliant in order to avoid more suffering. He was cold and hungry. More than anything, he wanted to go back home.  

_Home. Home. Home._

He didn’t have a home anymore. Heaven wasn’t an option and neither was the facility where he was currently being held prisoner. He was without a place to call home and without a person to call a friend, no one to help him or stand up for him and no safe haven to retreat to. Until that moment he’d never felt so lonely in his life, never felt so utterly and completely helpless.

            Luke smiled coldly as he watched the angel tremble, his blue eyes sparkling with cold delight. “Leave me alone,” Perseus whimpered, curling up. “Go away.” At this, Luke laughed.

            “That’s not likely, _Perseus_ ,” the human spat his name as if it were an insult. “I want you to know what it’s like to feel abandoned. I want you to know the meaning of suffering, for you clearly have only grazed the surface. I tend to rectify that now.” And with that he produced a whip from his belt.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Annabeth was woken to the sound of screaming. Horrible, agonized screaming. She shot out of bed and staggered to her dresser, fumbling for her knives in the darkness. Her head swam hazily from sleep and she knew that her hair must’ve been a big mess. What was it, three in the morning? She certainly wasn’t in the condition to rescue one of her comrades; she doubted that she could defeat an angel or demon that had managed to worm its way into the facility in owl jammies. She found the hilt of her long sword and threw the door open, running down the hall as fast as her feet were allowing.

            The screaming intensified, becoming harsher and harsher to the point where it was a ghastly screeching. It sounded so tormented, so tortured that Annabeth wondered if it was even human. Her vision blurred and she became rather nauseous from getting up so quickly, the vertigo making her stumble. Usually she would ease herself out of bed slowly, letting her body adjust to moving, but one of her partners was in danger, and she could waste no time trying to rescue them. She continued down the hall, watching as her comrades opened their doors and rubbed their eyes groggily, searching for the source of the scream with weary and tired, half-close eyes.

            Leo yawned and stretched, eying her strangely as she jogged down the hallway, her bare feet slapping on the floor more loudly than she would have liked. The floor was cold, too, sending chills up and down her spine; she had just gone from her warm, cozy comforter and sheets to the chilly air outside the bed. Gwen seemed rather confused and worried, and armor was hanging crookedly from her skinny frame as she tried to adjust it with fumbling hands and unfocused eyes.

            Reyna looked high on alert and seemed about to join Annabeth in her run towards the source of the screaming, but the leader of the Golden Swords motioned for her second-in-command to stay back, just in case it wasn’t a real problem. It was most likely just Dakota waking up from one of his hangovers, for Annabeth didn’t see him poking his head out of his room. Luke wasn’t in sight either, but he was a pretty deep sleeper; no scream would wake him up. Then again, he could be the one making the screams. She was half expecting Jason to emerge in all his blond-haired, bed-headed glory, shouting at the others to gather and help, but Annabeth’s heart ached when she realized that he no longer took up residence in the Golden Swords’ facility. Then it stopped. The person whom the scream had belonged to bubbled into tears, their hoarse sobbing echoing down the halls.

            Suddenly, Luke rounded the corner, covered from head to toe in blood. It was splattered on his shirt, pants, and even his face, flecking the sandiness of his hair with horrifying droplets of red. It looked like a Pollock painting gone wrong, and Annabeth was pretty sure her heart had stopped. He didn’t seem hurt, though; he wasn’t limping or staggering, wasn’t cradling a limb in his hands (either with a shattered bone or completely severed from his body, judging from the screams), and he didn’t seem to be in any sort of pain at all. His eyes held a sort of chilly content, cold and menacing, like a villain who smiled when an entire town was leveled. He didn’t seem like the one who had screamed, but then again who could it have been; Dakota had just staggered out of his room drunkenly, muttering gibbering in slurred words. Though she didn’t show it, it was the first time Annabeth had ever been genuinely afraid of Luke.

            “What was that? Why are you covered in blood?” the leader of the Golden Swords asked sleepily, still rubbing her eyes. _I probably look awful,_ she groaned to herself. _I have the bed hair, the bed breath, and the wrinkled pajamas to match._

“Just putting that piece of shit in its place,” Luke hissed between gritted teeth and left to his room, where he hopefully was going to take a shower. It took a few moments for Annabeth to register what he had meant by ‘piece of shit’, and she let out a gasp, breaking into a sprint. As she followed where Luke had come from, the trail of blood easy to detect, the soft crying grew louder, but still remained quiet and full of sorrow and loss. What had Luke done to the poor angel captive…what was his name…Perseus? Even if he had tried to kill him, he was still chained and defenseless inside his cell. Had that been Perseus’ blood that was slathered all over Luke?

            She came to the door of Perseus’ cell and peeked through the bars. The image before her would forever be plastered to the back of her eyelids. There was blood everywhere, covering the walls and the floor, and mostly covering the angel. His hair was matted with it and it gushed in rivers from his back, which was shredded to ribbons; straight, clean cuts that were so numerous there was barely any clear skin left. The wing stumps were mangled horribly, bleeding profusely. The angel himself was on his side, unmoving. His hand was stretched towards the door, reaching towards it as if he were begging for help from the outside, and his head was pillowed on his arm. The shackle on the outstretched wrist was stained red and the skin underneath it was mangled and ripped up from Perseus trying to get away. What had Luke done?

            She quickly entered the code into the panel and the door opened with a groan. The angel didn’t even look up as she walked over, leveling her sword at him as she inched closer. She prodded his shoulder gently with it, just to check if he was alive and not hostile, and he let out a brutal screech, his body convulsing and writhing in agony. Annabeth leapt back, dropping the sword out of astonishment, and it clattered to the ground. A tear trickled down the angel’s face and he whimpered. She couldn’t form words. How could Luke have heartlessly done this? Sure, it may have been out of revenge, but at least the human had gotten quick treatment when he was injured. This angel expected help from no one.

            It was at that moment that Reyna arrived at the cell door, gasping and staggering a little as she took in the sight. “Get me some medicine and supplies,” Annabeth ordered, her voice wavering as she fought back tears. She had to keep it together so that her team didn’t get panicked. They always panicked if their leader was distraught. The girl didn’t object as she took off down the halls once more, shouting something to the others that Annabeth didn’t bother to listen to. The leader of the Golden Swords approached the suffering angel, careful not to make any sudden movements and scare him even more than he already was.

 “Shh. Shh. It’s okay. I’m here,” she soothed, unsure that he even heard her. “I’m here to help.” A single green eye opened and looked at her, glassy with tears. It was filled with agony, sorrow, suffering, fear, and was that…guilt? A dull sheen had covered them in a film, making them seem blank, like the eyes of a corpse, yet Perseus was still breathing raggedly and shallowly.

            “He whipped me and beat me. It hurts,” he whispered, so softly that she could barely hear. He lifted his head weakly. “Are you here to hurt me, too?” Annabeth nearly broke down as his feeble words made her heart rip in two.

            “No, no. I’m here to help. Just don’t cry. It’s okay. You’re going to be fine. I’ll make sure he doesn’t hurt you anymore,” the angel let out a shaky sob. Annabeth knelt down beside him, her owl pajamas immediately became red and soggy, and she forced down her dinner, which was rising up into her throat, knowing fully well that it wouldn’t ease the terrified angel. She touched the angel’s back gingerly and he screeched at the top of his lungs, thrashing violently in his chains, which only made him scream more. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Annabeth cried, running her hands through his matted hair, and they stained red like her pajamas. He seemed to calm down as she stroked his head and neck gently, whispering words of encouragement. Where the hell was Reyna?

            As if on cue, the second in command dashed into the room, holding the gigantic first-aid kit. She had her eyes screwed shut as to not see the horrible scene in front of her, and she settled it down on the ground next to Annabeth, sprinting out of the room quickly. The leader immediately got to work, opening the kit up and sifting through the supplies tucked within it. She needed to sterilize the wounds before bandaging them, or else they would becoming infected, ultimately leading to the angel suffering even more.

            She produced some medical gloves and slipped them on, just in case the bacteria on her hands made the wounds sting, and they were already causing Perseus enough pain. She produced a bottle of water from the kit and uncapped it. “This is going to hurt,” she whispered to him.

            “Wha-?” Perseus’ question melted into a horrible scream as Annabeth poured the water all over the wounds and onto his wing stumps. “Mercy! Mercy!” he pleaded faintly and struggled feebly as she continued to empty out the bottle on his back. “Make it stop!” A tear trickled down Annabeth’s cheek and she discarded the water bottle, trading it for a medium-sized canteen full of morphine.

            “Here. This will make it stop.” She brought it to Perseus’ lips and the angel lapped at it eagerly, gulping it down to the point where any human would have died of an overdose. It was sad that he needed, or wanted for that matter, so much morphine just to stop feeling the agony inflicted upon him by one of the members of the Golden Swords, of _Annabeth’s_ Golden Swords. The grey-eyed mortal watched him for a moment as his eyes fluttered closed, his face going slack, and he began to snore softly. Her heart melted to goo. How could Luke ever do this to him? Annabeth decided to question him later, shaking her head clear and concentrating on the task at hand. She produced a cloth that had been stained red from previous usages from the kit, soaking it in rubbing alcohol, which was much more sterilizing than water could ever be. Holding it gingerly, she pressed the cloth to the wounds, cleaning all the blood off of them, which was a lot. The rag practically turned crimson, and Annabeth finally allowed herself the pleasure of puking off to the side after she wrung it out on the floor. Only the wing stumps continued to bleed, which made Annabeth worried; would they ever stop bleeding? And if so, when?

            She took out a surgical needle and thread and began stitching the wounds closed, using her gifted weaving skills to help with the process, though she knew that he would be able to heal on his own. It just felt right to speed up the procedure. She examined how deep the slashes were, and was surprised that he hadn’t gone into a coma like all angels do. Then again, humans could take a numerous amount of whippings; only when they were injured to the point where a mortal would’ve died did angels go into the coma. She flinched every time she made another stitch, wincing whenever she tied the knots. Now it was just the wing stumps that remained, and even though they had stopped bleeding they still looked pretty bad.

            Annabeth had no idea what to do; all her years of first-aid didn’t tell her how to treat wing wounds, for humans didn’t have wings. Angels, on the other hand, did, and she didn’t normally treat angels’ wounds. She did the best she could at cleaning out the injuries and bandaging it up. Annabeth surveyed her work and shivered a little; his back looked like Frankenstein’s and the bandages on his wing stumps already were already becoming soggy. All that was left to do was wait. Annabeth sighed and gathered the angel in her arms, cradling him and whispering words of encouragement. No creature, human or angel, should suffer like this, no matter how much people think they deserved it.

            After a long while of Annabeth rocking and whispering to him, the angel seemed to become conscious once more. He yawned broadly, revealing a cute pink tongue, and snuggled into the leader of the Golden Swords’ shoulder. He didn’t speak, but Annabeth didn’t need him to.

 “It’s okay,” she told him. “It’s okay. You’re safe now.” He didn’t even look up at her, and Annabeth gently threaded her fingers into his hair. “I’ll make sure nothing will ever happen to you. I promise.” She knew something was wrong, though, and she tried not to be worried.

 

\-----Ω----

 

            It all started when Perseus stopped eating. Annabeth had hoped that, with enough TLC and attention, the angel would perk back up, even if it took months. Well, months passed and Perseus still didn’t get better. Even if he was unchained and the door to his room was left open, he refused to get up from bed, or, more accurately, didn’t see a reason to do so. Instead of the bright-eyed angel who she’d tried to distance herself from, Annabeth was facing a stony faced one who would only eat or drink if fed and only got up to go to the bathroom, which came attached to his new, more comfortable room. The old one was locked up, kept closed off to prevent the awful memories that came along with it from being released from its depths.

            That day he’d been no more responsive than usual, looking frail and alone on his plush twin bed with his back to everyone, opting to face the blank wall. Leo went in to try and cheer him up, because even his corny jokes made people laugh, and even though the mechanic had been trying for a while, he still had hope that he’d be the one to finally crack a smile from the angel. Unsurprisingly, Perseus never laughed for the duration of the visit. Never even looked at him, and the silences that stretched in between were long and strained. Meals were tense and sullen, though Luke was unaffected by the angel’s suffering, still grinning and cracking jokes that everyone else, much like Perseus, never laughed at.

            When Annabeth had confronted him, furious, he’d just stood there and took it quietly while she chewed his head off, and if she didn’t know better she’d think that he was trying not to laugh. Luke had been one of her best friends, one of her closest allies, and now he was reduced to this unfeeling…creature…that certainly wasn’t the Luke that Annabeth had known all her life. It was an awful thought, but a part of her knew that this is how Luke had always been, that she’d just overlooked the imperfections.

            Whenever Annabeth fed Percy, he’d always willingly opened up and chewed and swallowed and then pooped it out without any help needed. He just didn’t want to do it himself. Today was different. Annabeth came in with the tray, as Perseus was facing the wall as usual, his ragged wing stumps there for all to see, and it made the human sick to her stomach every time she saw them.

            “Breakfast,” she announced, just to make herself feel better, but Perseus didn’t stir. That was the first sign that something was wrong; at first Perseus hadn’t even responded, but they’d developed a routine that involved him turning over onto his other side. He didn’t do that today. Clearing he throat, Annabeth announced once more, “Breakfast!” The angel still didn’t move, but he did let out a heavier breath than he normally did. “C’mon, Percy, don’t be difficult.” The nickname didn’t normally slip from her lips, but it came up every now and then, and every time Perseus had flinched at the name, as if it physically hurt him.

            He hadn’t uttered a word since that night he begged Annabeth to stop cleaning his wounds because it hurt, and it sent Annabeth reeling when Perseus, in a hoarse, ragged voice, stated, “Please leave. Don’t come back. Don’t send anyone. Pretend I don’t exist.”

            “What for?” Annabeth scoffed when she finally managed to get her voice to work, but a million different questions were bouncing around in her head, waiting just at the tip of her tongue. She didn’t want to overwhelm the angel back into silence, though, and she was grasping onto his every word like precious drops of rain during a drought. “Don’t you want food?”

            “No, I don’t. Don’t feed me,” Perseus replied, his voice sounding dead.

            “So, you’re not hungry? Do you want me to leave it here?” Annabeth asked, her tone becoming desperate. She was smart. She knew what Perseus was trying to do, but she was desperately trying to grasp for strings, any excuses that would suggest that he’s doing something else.

            “Throw it out,” Perseus replied. “And when you leave, please shut the door behind you.”

            “I’m not leaving,” Annabeth told him firmly, setting the tray down on the end table at the foot of his bed. “I’m going to feed you like we usually do, but this time you’re going to talk, okay?” Ironically, Perseus didn’t reply. She took the spoon in hand and scooped up the cereal, Frosted Flakes to be exact. Easily swallowed and dissolvable. Regardless of the awkward position, she leaned over the angel and put the spoon up to his mouth. He didn’t eat it, just stared at Annabeth with a broken, defeated look in his eyes. She tried to push the tip against Perseus’ lips but he pursed his lips tightly, even doing so much as turning his head away and refusing the food.

            “It’s not worth it,” he hissed. “I’m a waste of space who doesn’t need food in the first place.”

            “Yes, you do. You told me so before…” She shook her head and returned to insistently shoving the spoon forwards, the milk sloshing around and spilling all over Perseus’ front. The angel didn’t seem to care in the slightest. “And are you really listening to what Luke told you? None of that is true. You’re a person. You deserve better treatment.”

            “What I deserve is nothing. I’m not listening to Luke’s words, I’m listening to the philosophy behind them,” Perseus’ voice broke and he buried his face into the pillow, either refusing to look at Annabeth or avoid the poking and prodding she did with the spoon. Possibly both. “I’m nothing. I’m useless.”

            “Again, that’s not true,” Annabeth insisted. “Hey, I’m an angel hunter…or, I was. I haven’t been hunting angels lately, and neither have any of my comrades. Well, except Luke. But I still think life is still worth living, and I’ve had some pretty low points.”

            “Well I bet you haven’t been as low as I am right now. Both literally and figuratively,” Perseus growled into the pillow, his words muffled. “Just get out.”

            “Percy-”

            “I SAID GET OUT!”

 

\----Ω----

 

            “Jason?”

            “Hey, Annabeth, I haven’t heard from you in a while-”

            “Jason you need to come over. Something terrible has happened.”

            “…”

            “Please, it’s Perseus.”

            “I’m on my way.”


	10. The Serpent's Teacher

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for drug use and overdoses

            “Listen, I have to go to a meeting. I’ll be back in ten,” Annabeth sighed and rose to her feet. She cast a forlorn look at Perseus, who didn’t so much as glance at her, and left without a word, muttering obscenities under her breath. The angel knew that he was making the beautiful human worry, knew that he shouldn’t be this cruel to her, but he truly couldn’t find a reason to do anything else. His stomach was hollow and it occasionally gave pitiful moans of agony, but he didn’t feel it anymore. After the first few days, he nearly caved, nearly ate all the food and drank all the water that was offered to him, but he’d had self-restraint and it was easier now. His throat was a desert, but it only took three days until he slipped into the Healing Slumber. It was nice, just to sleep and not have any rhyme or reason to it, but the best part was that there were no dreams, unlike last time. Every three days he slipped into the Healing Slumber, and he especially loved when his starvation and dehydration synced up and he experienced two consecutive Healing Slumbers in a day. This was nice. Better than the world out there, for sure.

            It was about two days into his dehydration streak and seventeen days into his starvation when Luke came, right after Annabeth had left. Alarm bells set off inside the angel’s head, and the scars on his back ached in sympathy, but Perseus felt disconnected from his body, a bystander on all levels but physical. In this state he was in, it was like floating on air or drifting out on open sea; he didn’t know where he was, but it certainly wasn’t in that room with Luke. It was for the best in the long run, and he would’ve grinned had it not taken so much energy out of him. He slept most of the time, now. Most were plagued with horrible nightmares of a whip and a sneering face, but others held images of golden eagles and piercing blue eyes. The Healing Slumber was the only time that none of those dreams could reach him, and he felt so frustrated that he had to wait another day before it returned.

            “Hello there, Mr. Slim Jim,” Luke chuckled, giving a pointed look at Perseus’ body. By no means was the messenger the beautiful seraph he’d once been; his cheeks were hollowed, his collarbones sharp, his arms and legs like toothpicks, and his ribs could be counted. He was ugly, and that was a bit of a blow; he’d always prided his ethereal exterior, which was much prettier than the gnarled insides, and now that that was gone he officially considered the old Perseus deceased. Even though his sluggish thoughts processed that he was hurting, and not only physically, Perseus couldn’t really grasp on to them, and they flitted out of reach before he could do anything about it.

            “I see we’re not so mouthy anymore. You’ve learned very well from my lesson, though I wish you’d cut the whole not eating or drinking thing. It’d be much better if my companions could bear witness to your obedience,” the mortal sneered, shoving the angel lightly. It hurt, considering he was basically skin and bones now, but he couldn’t find it in himself to mind much. “Annabeth’s at a meeting with the rest of the Scooby Gang, to talk about you. They didn’t invite me, of course, because they’re talking about how they can get Jason over here; he can’t skip out on his new fancy job and he doesn’t have any days off. Too bad he values the cash he’s getting from it more than he values coming to visit. Never mind that, though; it gives us time to have a little fun. The walls in the meeting room are soundproof, you know, so no saviors coming this time.” Perseus ignored him, retreating deep inside of himself to avoid the confrontation.

            “Not listening, I see? Pity. I was going to tell you that there was a way to go into the Healing Slumber without having a cooldown period.” For the first time in what felt like ages, Perseus turned his head, his neck cramping painfully as he turned to look at the sparkling blue eyes that shone with a malice unlike anything he’d ever seen. Only the most evil of demons had ever demonstrated such malevolence.

            “You have my ears,” the angel’s voice went barely above a whisper, hoarse from disuse.

            “Why, thank you, my good man,” Luke’s grin was absolutely wicked. “Here.” He set down a small box on the table at the end of Perseus’ bed, where that day’s breakfast was slowly going bad. The angel could smell the spoiling milk, and needless to say it was unpleasant. He would’ve thrown up had he had anything left inside. The angel was curious to say the least. He wanted the Healing Slumber and he wanted it now, and it was an incredible thing to know that he could get it with whatever Luke was going to show him.

            “This,” he began, opening the box and producing a syringe and what looked like a pouch of white powder, “is your ticket to whatever you call that coma-thing you do when you die. I can’t maim you, but maybe you can maim yourself a little more than you already have.” Wow, that sounded very, very cryptic and certainly not good for Perseus’ overall health. Then again, he wanted to achieve the Healing Slumber consecutively, and he swallowed hard when Luke scooped the powder into a measuring cup and held up a lighter underneath it. The sickening aroma of the melting powder made Perseus almost want to back out of this whole thing, but he supposed that it could do no real harm. It was of mortal origin, of course. He had a vague idea of the identity of the powder, but he could infer that it was some sort of mortal drug. Angels were capable of getting addicted, they were the models for humans, after all, and an especially potent drug was the angel equivalent of heroin, called Raven Wing. Then it dawned on him what the powder was. Heroin.

            “That’s not going to do much to help,” the angel told him doubtfully, his brow crinkling. “Heroin is a white, crystalline, narcotic powder, C21 H23  NO5 , derived from morphine, formerly used as an analgesic and sedative. It won’t put me into the Healing Slumber.”

            “Wow, you’re like a walking, talking encyclopedia of…weirdness,” Luke replied, chuckling, but his eyes were pits, devoid of any and all humor. “But the part about the…Healing Slumber…is wrong. You only survive if you want to live long enough for another dose.” The angel’s eyebrows shot up to his forehead, and then it seemed to dawn on him. Oh. He needed an overdose. Just like how he’d overdosed on the morphine Annabeth had given him. He was unsure of whether or not he should do something like that; it wouldn’t aid in getting his angelic beauty back, but he’d have to stash his pride and vanity aside. He’d felt like he was floating in the clouds when the lights had went out and he’d downed half the bottle of morphine. It’d been very pleasant, though he’d taken that drug orally. He didn’t know if he’d like needles that much.

            “This is pure heroin. Not cut with anything, at all, and I made fucking sure of that,” Luke told him as he filled the huge syringe with a small needle, made for injecting large doses of something without poking through someone’s arm. “Just pull this plunger and empty it and it should be enough to OD. Considering you’re a new man every time you come back to life, it should remain constant, but you’ll need bigger syringes than this if you develop a tolerance.”

            “I-I don’t think I want to do this,” Perseus croaked as he watched the syringe with wide eyes as Luke approached. He was using the same swaggering gate as he had when he’d produced the whip from his belt, and it was doing all kinds of things to the angel and his fragile sanity.

            “I’m afraid you don’t have a choice. I would’ve done this whether you like it or not. You probably won’t even get addicted, considering you die and then come back as good as new after one dose, but you’re already addicted to that Healing Slumber of yours. Is that even possible?” Luke scowled as the angel recoiled, and the messenger forced himself not to hyperventilate as the metal point of the syringe glinted in the light. Luke covered the distance in two short steps, until he was right at his bedside. Perseus was too weak to run, and too weak to fight, but he wouldn’t let this mortal do this to him. He was a new angel now, and he realized that he didn’t want this. He’d start eating, he’d start talking, and he’d even laugh at Leo’s stupid jokes if it meant that Luke didn’t inject him with this stuff.

            Luke raised the needle and Perseus, in a panic and slightly deranged from dehydration and hunger, lashed out at the mortal weakly, and it was no surprise when Luke grabbed his arm with one hand and held it in a death grip. The angel thrashed and screamed, but nobody came to his aid as Luke plunged the syringe into the angel’s arm, releasing the heroin into Perseus’ bloodstream. He could feel the drug raging in his veins, but for some odd reason he felt good. Great, even. _That’s just the drug telling you how to feel,_ he scolded himself. As soon as it had started, it was over.

            “I’ll just leave this here.” Luke sneered sadistically and placed the syringe and the pouch and lighter back into the box, tucking it under the bed and grinning up at the trembling angel, who was beginning to feel nauseous and dizzy. “Just in case you need it.” And with that, he was gone. Perseus was only barely able to turn before he vomited, acid rising up and burning his throat as it splattered onto the floor. Black spots danced in front of his eyes, and he decided that he didn’t like this at all. It was suddenly hard to breathe and his mind flashed back to the scroll he’d read on mortal drugs:

            _An overdose on heroin causes the respiratory system to collapse, which begins immediately after the lethal amount of the drug is taken in._

He gasped for air, but his lungs just wouldn’t work.

            _The diaphragm fails._

He clawed at his throat and dry heaved, and suddenly he couldn’t breathe in. His brain was shrieking for his lungs to _EXPAND EXPAND EXPAND EXPAND_ but they were lead within his chest.

            _Many times the victim suffocates inside their own vomit._

His stomach tried to dry heave but there was absolutely nothing left, and he didn’t have the air to do it. He collapsed onto the pillow, his eyes rolling back into his head.

 

            _The lungs and diaphragm completely shut down, and the victim is dead within minutes._

 

\----Ω----

 

            When Perseus woke up the next day, having experienced a longer Healing Slumber than starvation or dehydration could ever have provoked, he was full of a euphoria that he hated. His blood snag in his veins and he felt like he was riding on a cresting wave, completely weightless. He hated that he loved it. Hated that his body loved it. When Annabeth came to see him she was more than astonished when she saw Perseus sitting up and talking, and she nearly fainted when he asked for a whole buffet of food.

            “Hey, Jason? You don’t have to come over anymore. We’ve got it all sorted out.” Perseus could hear the smile in her voice, and he felt sick to his stomach to know that she was being told a lie, that she thought everything was A-OK, but one problem had blended into another. One that was much worse than plain old refusing to eat and drink.

He consume as much sustenance as possible to distract himself, but a drumbeat had been introduced into his head, one that beat faintly at first but then eventually escalated to a catastrophic throbbing that made his temples pulse with the thrum of his heart. He knew what was happening; the symptoms of withdrawal had also been stated on that scroll. He tried, he really, really did, but that, along with his craving to slip away from reality and back into the Healing Slumber, made him but a mere puppet to his desires.

            When Annabeth and the others had left, he closed the door quietly and reached under the bed. Needless to say, Luke had lied when he said the drug wasn't addictive, though Perseus didn’t seem to think he should be surprised.

 

\----Ω----

 

            “Listen, we had a deal. I supply you with your much-needed drug and you help me kill Annabeth the next time she enters your cell. How come you didn’t do ask I asked, huh? What’s going on in that noggin of yours?” Luke knocked on Perseus’ forehead for effect. “Has the heroin gotten to your head already?” That struck a nerve, for the angel flinched as he made the remark. Averting his gaze, Perseus hugged himself and tucked his legs against his body. Luke had full control over him now. At any time that Perseus was disobeying him, he could easily cut his supply off and leave him suffering.

            “I can’t,” he whispered, his voice ragged. You could already see the effect just a month of being on the drug had on the angel’s beauty, which had been lousy beforehand. Sure, he no longer looked like a corpse now that he’d gone back to eating and drinking again, but another kind of repulsiveness graced his features. There were deep shadows under his eyes, which had sunken into his head. The green color of his irises, which had once been vibrant and beautiful, had turned dull and muddy. His lips were chapped and peeling, and his fingers were gnarled and simply disgusting. He hated Luke for that one day all those weeks ago, that one day that had sent his world spiraling out of control. He hated Luke more than he hated himself, and that was saying a lot.

            “What do you mean ‘I can’t’? Sure, _you_ can’t, but _I_ can; just lure her in here and I can finish her off. Once she’s gone, all I have to do is get rid of Reyna and then guess who’s the leader of the Golden Swords becomes?” Luke pointed to himself with a crooked smile on his face. “Me.”

            “It’s funny how you humans only think of yourselves without caring about what other people may think,” Perseus growled. Luke threw his head back and laughed a hearty laugh.

            “Oh, you’re the one to talk!” he cackled and gestured to the underside of the bed, where the box was safely tucked away “It’s starting to become noticeable, you know. You pitiful, rotten thing.”

            “I completely agree,” Perseus replied quietly, looking down at his ugly hands that were folded in his lap. His hands used to be beautiful. A nice tan, with perfect fingernails and skin as soft as silk. Now his hands didn’t belong to him anymore; the tan had long since faded, replaced by a horrific chalky white, and is fingernails were chipped and jagged. His skin was now rough and gnarled, with knobs and wrinkles like a tree’s. Crop out Perseus’ young face and body and you’d see an old man’s hands, not the hands that should belong to a celestial being. The drug had ruined his life. Ruined who he was as an angel. There was no chance of redemption, now. No chance of going home.

            “Well? Are you gonna do it right next time she’s here?” Luke hissed.

            “Yes,” Perseus replied, sounding dead. God, even his voice had changed. It was raucous and frayed, as if someone had clawed at his throat to shreds.

            “You better, or I cut your supply off for however long I see fit.” And with that, Luke left, slamming the door behind him. Perseus would’ve given anything for those happy days in between his “freeing” and his major emotional breakdown, the ones where he was just happy to wander the room and talk to Jason and the others without any hindrance whatsoever. But those days were long gone. A lot had changed in the Golden Swords’ headquarters. A new member had been added, his name being Will Solace. He was an excellent healer, and had come in to chat more than once with the angel. He was kind, with big ideas and even a bigger heart. He’d wanted to become a doctor, but, like the other members of the Golden Swords, had been dirt poor. He certainly didn’t have enough to afford college before, and he’d let it slip that he was paying for tuition using wings that the others were willing to donate for him; he never hunted angels himself, much like Leo.

            The former messenger angel sat in silence, letting tears drip down his face, and he was glad that Luke had turned off the lights. He didn’t want to risk someone walking in on him and finding him like this. For a moment he considered taking more of the drug, but he fought the addiction; the more you consume it, the more it controls you and the faster it kills you. But Perseus had already taken too much, and the addiction was stronger than iron, as unbreakable as titanium. It clawed at him and urged him to take some more.

            _Just a tad won’t hurt._

_Only a morsel._

_No damage done._

_It makes you happy. What’s the harm?_

_More._

_More._

_More._

The voices rose from a coaxing whisper to a demanding screech, constricting the poor angel and taking control of his thoughts. Without thought, Perseus produced his needle and his pouch of the drug, which Luke usually confiscated every time he visited to keep their exchange a secret. He melted the powder and filled the syringe, as he had done many times before, and injected it into his arm, though it wasn’t enough to put him into the Healing Slumber. That addiction had long since faded; it was just a plus that came from the heroin, and he felt disgusting as the plunger finally went as far as it could go. The drug leaped through his bloodstream, the rush just as invigorating as it’d been the first time.

            It felt good, giving the angel a tingling feeling. He let out a deep breath, and along with it went each and every one of his worries, including his worries about his addiction, which was rather ironic. He sighed and closed his eyes, allowing the drug to soothe and comfort him, wrapping him into an embrace that no other thing could possibly do. He completely forgot that the needle was still in his hand, and he certainly didn’t hear the footsteps coming down the hall that certainly weren’t Luke’s.

 

\----Ω----

  **Earlier…**

 

            _Jason was glad with is new life. No more Candymen. No more debt. No more Golden Swords. No more double shifts. And last but certainly not least, no more angels. No. More. Angels. He sighed and relaxed into the couch that was more comfortable than his bed back at the slums. He hadn’t visited at all, and when Annabeth had called him in panic about Perseus he’d almost made up an excuse on why he couldn’t go. Luckily, there had actually been a legitimate excuse, his job, and he knew that whatever was wrong with Perseus couldn’t be that bad, though he felt hollow whenever he thought of the poor messenger angel. The messenger angel whose wings he’s sold in order to buy a mansion. From what Annabeth had said, he’d been unchained for a while now, so he couldn’t possibly be all that miserable with free reign. The new kid, Will Solace, was a good guy who seemed like the type to befriend angels, judging from what he’d heard from Annabeth on the phone, and he hoped that the two got along._

_He put his thoughts aside and turned to Thalia, who strut down the hall in the new dress that Jason had bought her for her birthday. It was black with sequins along the neckline and lace sleeves, and she looked absolutely stunning. She twirled and Jason gave her a thumbs up, a genuine smile touching his features. Now that they weren’t in poverty anymore, Thalia had finally forgiven her brother after years of grudging against him. Their relationship wasn’t as strong and as fun as it once was, but at least they could salvage it after a long time of avoiding one another as they struggled to make ends meet. Now they were basically rich, and Thalia was able to join a very popular girl band._

_It was called The Hunters of Artemis and it consisted of Naomi Stein on guitar, Phoebe Regis on bass, Celyn Clair on drums, and Bianca di Angelo as a backup singer. Last, but certainly not least, is Artemis Stargazer (Her real last name being Harrison) as the lead singer. She was gorgeous, athletic, and had a pretty damn good voice. It was too bad she was a hardcore misandrist along with the rest of her band, and she despised men more than the rest did._

_Thalia met the group of very popular girls at the nearby beach not long after she and her brother had moved, and when they learned her tragic life story and her revulsion to men (though she really was more of a feminist than a misandrist), they immediately offered her a position as another backup singer, who could also play the acoustic guitar when needed. Jason’s sister spent a lot of time on tour now or hanging out with the band to rehearse or come up with new songs. It became lonely for Jason at times, but the loneliness never stayed long. It wasn’t that different than when they weren’t getting along; she’d do anything to get away from him, even take extra hours at work if it meant avoiding coming face to face with her brother._

_Thalia took a seat next to Jason and ruffled his hair. “Now you be good while I’m gone. I can’t believe we’re going to the Grammy Awards! We’ve been dreaming of this for…forever!” she hugged him. “Try not to break anything.”_

_“I won’t. I think I’m going to go hang out with my friends for a bit and staying there for a few days, and trust me, we’ll all be routing for you guys. All the other artists better watch out, because the Hunters of Artemis are going to win every Grammy you’re nominated for,” Jason assured his sister. Her face darkened at the mention of his friends, but she grinned through it; she wasn’t going to have her mood dampened by her brother’s whereabouts._

_“The limo will be here soon,” she told him. “God, I’m going to be all the way in Los Angeles while you’re going to be in those slums…” Thalia trailed off, chewing on her lip. Jason put a reassuring hand on her shoulder._

_“I’ll be fine, Thals. Promise. Now I’d better get going. Your friends hate me. Break a leg,” he kissed her on the cheek and stood up, putting on his coat and grabbing his car keys from the counter. He waved goodbye to his sister as he closed the door, but she didn’t wave back._

 

\----Ω----

 

            Two blue eyes stared at Perseus from the threshold, filled with awe. The angel fumbled the needle in his hand and quickly tried to hide it, but the damage had been done. Jason gaped at him, his mouth hanging open like a door with a broken hinge, and Perseus burned with shame. Jason would be more disgusted with him than he had been before. Why was he here? Hadn’t he left the Golden Swords for good? It didn’t matter now. Jason certainly wasn’t leaving anytime soon.

            “Perseus,” he whispered. The angel lowered his head, humiliation and self-hatred licking through his body like flames. His heart sank when he mortal walked over to the bed slowly, like he was approaching a spooked animal. He didn’t look that broken, did he? He couldn’t be sure. It’d been such a long time since he’d looked into the mirror for more than a moment. He knew why it hurt him so much for Jason to see him like this; it was because he didn’t want to let him down. Again. He held the human in high esteem and didn’t want to lose any more of his respect than he’d already done. Jason was forgiving and trustworthy, unlike the angel Perseus, who was a backstabbing heroin addict that would do anything in order to keep his supply of his drug. He’d been planning on luring Annabeth into his cell for Luke to kill her, and the thought made his eyes water. He felt Jason kneeling down beside the bed, but he didn’t dare look to see the expression on his face. Perseus felt the human gently slipping the needle from his hand with a tenderness that he didn’t know Jason possessed. Another hand fumbled around and finally grasped the small pouch filled with Perseus’ drug.

            The angel knew that the human was opening it, and he heard him inhale sharply. “Well, we have a problem,” Jason said flatly.

            “No shit,” Percy hissed and his vision began to swirl. Perhaps he’d taken more of the heroin than he’d thought. Pretty soon, everything faded to blackness, which he welcomed with open arms.


	11. The Fractured Legacy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all like it, and don't forget to leave a comment and kudos!

            Jason had absolutely no idea how he managed to “rescue” Perseus from that God-awful facility. He basically told Annabeth that he was taking the angel back to his house and she was just like, “Ok.” How was she so nonchalant about it? Had she befriended Perseus in some way, shape, or form?

            “He was…sick,” Annabeth said slowly as she waited outside of Perseus’ room as Jason packed the angel’s things, or, more notably, the wooden box. “And he wouldn’t talk or eat or even look at anyone, so I sort of sat next to him. Kept him company. He didn’t realize it, but it was pleasant to know you could talk to someone and not have them judge you or it, though I doubt he was even listening.” A dark expression passed over her face in that moment, full of an emotion that Jason later identified as guilt, and she left them to their own devices. Of course, the other members knew about this “liberation”, and had been one hundred percent cool with it. In fact, Will had actually hugged Jason and thanked him for getting the angel out of there. Luke, however, was the only one who was kept in the dark about Perseus’ freedom, since if he did he’d probably blow his top, but he’d probably figure it out sooner or later. But take one glace at poor Perseus and you knew that Luke didn’t really show appreciation for the angel, considering he’s probably the one who introduced the heroin to him.

            It was risky for Jason to take the angel back to his house. It was common for addicts to become aggressive, and if Perseus went all smitey-angel-of-power-and-destruction on him, he was as good as dead. Even in this weakened state, Perseus was ten times more powerful than Jason, and this time Jason didn’t have weapons. He did have guilt, though, and it would make him feel like he deserved death for what he'd done to the angel, that it was all his fault. Thalia would find his body after she was done hanging with the Hunters of Artemis, and she would be heartbroken. Speaking of the Hunters, he’d probably missed the Grammies, but soon decided he'd just have to settle for watch the re-run, because he had much bigger problems on his hands.

            At the moment Perseus was just lying on his bed, staring at his savior. Jason couldn’t help but notice how dull and sunken his eyes were, probably as a result of the drug, and he was incredibly thin, though Annabeth had told him that he hadn’t eaten for a period of time (how long, Jason didn’t know) and he’d probably just started to fill out when the drug came into his life. Jason had no idea how to ease Perseus off of the addiction, but for now the angel was allowed to use the minimal supply in the pouch. Both Jason and the angel knew that it wouldn’t last forever, and that they would be in big trouble when the it ran out; pure, uncut heroin was pretty fucking expensive, and Jason was sure that it’d cost him a pair of angel wings for every dosage. Jason couldn’t spend so much money without Thalia realizing it, and the blond certainly wasn't going to go back to angel hunting. He was over that now.

            “Thank you,” Perseus said suddenly, his voice barely above anything more than a whisper. “For everything.” Jason was kneeling next to his bed and his head was level with the angel’s and he saw just how dead his green eyes were, how empty. It made Jason want to cry, but he forced the tears back for Perseus’ sake.

            “Jason?” the angel asked quietly. The blond’s head snapped to attention and he staggered to his feet.

            “Do you need anything, Perseus? Food? Water? Blue cookies?” A small smile formed on the angel’s chapped and peeling lips.

            “Not what I had in mind, but they would be nice,” he chuckled and then winced, as if his body was punishing him for being happy. He hesitated for a moment, his eyes searching Jason’s and then heaved a deep breath and said, “But before you leave, I’d like you to start calling me Percy.”

            “Percy,” Jason repeated, as if testing the name on his tongue, the name that the angel had originally forbade him from saying. “I like that name.” He quickly rushed to the lavish kitchen, where the cook was waiting. She hadn’t questioned Jason when he’d hauled Percy into the house, carrying him bridal-style. She had probably supposed that it was just one of Jason’s friends that was exceedingly drunk. “Can I get some blue cookies?”

            “ _Blue_ cookies?” the cook asked in bewilderment. “Why blue?”

            “I dunno. I just feel in the mood for them.” Knowing Jason’s monstrous appetite and his occasional cravings for odd foods such as calamari for breakfast and chocolate Chex for dinner, the cook only rolled her eyes and began preparing the meal. Jason thanked her wholeheartedly and rushed back to his room, where Percy was currently residing. He had no idea how long the angel would be staying, but he was determined to make Percy comfortable until his addiction was cured. Jason heard that recovering was rare and even if it worked it could take weeks, maybe even months, and Jason certainly couldn’t take his friend to the hospital; they would be suspicious about his whip scars and about the two wing stumps that still stood ugly and deformed on his shoulder blades, not to mention his horrible emaciation.

            He opened the door to find Percy standing up, looking out the window. He was disappointed that he hadn’t been there to assist the angel when he tried to walk, but he brushed it aside. “You sure have a wonderful view,” Percy breathed, his green eyes searching the ocean as if he were trying to find an answer within it. “Last time I saw this beauty was in…in…in Heaven.”

            “You don’t have to think about it,” Jason told him gently as he walked up beside him. Percy gave him a forlorn look, the corners of his mouth turning downwards.

            “Apparently people say it helps to express your sour memories to others,” he replied, lowering his gaze to his feet. “I wish to convey mine to you.”

            “Take your time,” the former angel hunter replied and placed a hand on Percy’s shoulder. “You don’t have to tell me, you know. If it makes it hurt more, you have to tell me. Sometimes pushing yourself isn’t always a good thing.”

            “Oh. Thank you, but I understand. I don’t have to say it verbally,” Percy told him. “I can show you. Even though it’s about ten times worse than just talking to you about it.”  

            “What, are you going to put on some sort of PowerPoint presentation?” Jason asked at an attempt for humor. Percy chuckled at this, revealing dimples that would make any person coo as if they were mooning over an adorable kitty cat. “Seriously, who are you so set on showing your memories? It’s gonna hurt you in the long run.”

            “No, I’m not going to put on a PowerPoint,” he snorted. “But I need to show you this so you can try to convince your friends to stop angel hunting. They’ve been forced into that life, and they have big hearts, so it may not take all that much.” Jason’s expression sobered.

            “I don’t know if I can do that. They’re all having a lot of trouble. Financially, I mean.”

            “Yes, but there are better ways to get all that money back than to hunt angels,” Percy snapped. “Besides, I can show you a few tricks, a few ways to tweak the system that are on more levels than physical.”

            “Really? How?” The angel only grinned.

“I need you to hold out your hands. And you have to promise that you won’t convey this information. If you do, well I’ll have to execute you.”

            “That’s a joke, right?” Jason laughed. Percy wasn’t laughing.

            “Who said it was a joke?” Jason’s face fell. “Anyway, even if I did have to kill you I doubt I’d be able to in this condition. Then the Archangels would cast me into Hell for not killing you.”

            “Harsh,” Jason whistled.

            “Very,” Percy replied flatly.

            “So, Archangels are like the head honchos? The most powerful angels in existence?” Jason asked.

            “No, actually. That’s a very common mistake amongst you mortals. It’s actually very complicated, you see-” Percy paused, thoughtful for a moment. “You know what, let me just show you. And remember, no talking, writing, gossiping, zip.” He mimed zippering his mouth closed. Jason nodded as a signal that he’d gotten the message. He held out his hands and locked gazes with the angel, his blue eyes hard with determination. Percy looked hesitant. “Are you ready? The emotions and the sensations can be very real…”

            “I’m certainly ready. You’re not,” Jason told him sharply. “Are _you_ ready?” Percy seemed rather reluctant and fretful, but his expression of worry turned into that of raw willpower. He took a hold of Jason’s hands and immediately light began to swarm Jason’s vision. The former angel hunter began to panic, even though he kept telling himself over and over that it wasn’t real. Pretty soon he was plunged deep into Perseus’ memories.

 

\----Ω----

 

_“Son, you must promise not to touch.”_

_“Yes, Father.”_

“You’re looking through my eyes as of now,” Perseus told him, his voice echoing inside of Jason’s head. “These are my memories of the seven Heavens, and I’m lucky I’m a messenger because I got to visit all of them. Most angels live their lives never leaving their birth Heaven.”

            “Wait…seven Heavens? As in more than one?” Jason asked, shocked and filled with an incredibly sense of vertigo that was disconnected from all the emotions that this past Perseus was feeling.

            “Indeed.”

            _“Okay, make sure you stay in my arms and don’t do anything. The Creator will kill me if I mess this all up.”_

“Who’s that?” Jason asked as Perseus looked up at the smiling face of a bearded man with black hair and green eyes.

            “That’s my father, Poseidon. He’s an angel of nature who came up with the…erm…blueprints for water. He’s the entire reason why you mortals are even alive,” the messenger told him as his notably meatier hands reached up to grab at Poseidon’s nose.

 _“Sure, Dad,”_ he replied in a voice that was much readier than Jason had grown accustomed to. _“You’re so cool.”_

 _“Why, thank you,”_ Poseidon replied, his laugh reverberating through him and causing Perseus’ back and wings to vibrate with the movement, considering the angel was pressed against the larger angel’s chest. _“Just tell Hades that now.”_

“Hades?”

            “Nico’s father. Our families were related in every aspect but blood.”

            “Oh. I’m sorry.”

            Perseus didn’t reply.

            _“So where is it?”_ Past Perseus asked, and it was clear that he was filled with wonder. The sights that the young angel was seeing made Jason dizzy; there was nothing around them but stars. Little white pinpoints that spangled the sky and twinkled down at them, though Jason soon realized that no, they weren't twinkling.

            “Are you in space?” he asked, awed.

            “No, we’re in the first Heaven, Shamayim; ruled by Archangel Gabriel the messenger. Its borders do connect with the mortal universes though, and that’s what makes it possible for us to cross into it,” Perseus replied. “But just a note, this is far before any humans were ever created.”

            “How far?”

            “Very.”

            “You just don’t want to admit that you’re old,” Jason teased, and he could feel the angel’s amusement pulsing off of him in waves, and he could almost see the lopsided grin on his face. It was nice to be here, with just him, Perseus, and the past version of Perseus, all squished into one mind and body.

            “Perhaps.”

            _“Okay, here it is,” Poseidon announced triumphantly. “Remember: NO TOUCHING. At all. It took me years to get permission from the Metatron…”_

“The Transformer?”

            “No, that’s Megatron. This is the Scribe of God.”

            “Oh.”

            _“…and I don’t want to ruin my chances of coming back again.”_

 _“Okay. I got it,” Past Perseus replied, sounding determined. “I’ll be good. No touching allowed.”_ And then Jason saw it, and his breath was stolen away from him.

            _“It’s still a work in progress,”_ Poseidon remarked, _“but I think it’s good enough.”_ Hovering in front of them, no larger than a baseball, was Earth. The moon was basically a Froot Loop, and the vertigo Jason was feeling was absolutely insane. That was where he lived, or in this case will live eventually, and it looked so _tiny._ So insignificant.

            “It’s beautiful,” Jason breathed, and he could feel the pride pulsing off of the messenger in waves.

            “Indeed it is, but just a note that that’s my true form, which is rarely used unless in battle with a force larger than ourselves,” Perseus replied. “This is my fondest memory of my father.” The mood changed abruptly, replaced by bitterness and guilt, and Jason forced himself to concentrate on looking through Past Perseus’ eyes. His little hands were being kept occupied by Poseidon’s big ones, and the you angel’s back was pressed against his father’s chest as the angel of nature made well sure that his son didn’t touch the Earth and cause a mass extinction.

            “What life was on Earth now?” Jason asked, wrenching Perseus out of his despair and trying for a lighter mood.

            “This was the beginning of the era of soft-bodied creatures, ones that you mortals have no records of because there were no bones to preserve. It’s mostly corals, though,” the angel replied, obviously glad to steer away from his past. The two of them watched for a while, infatuated with the way Poseidon cared for his son, telling him all about what the Creator planned to do.

            “Let’s move on to the second Heaven, now. It’s much more interesting.” Jason thought that this place was pretty interesting, but Percy’s excitement made him give in. Past Percy blinked and suddenly they were submerged into a whole new world. “I was older when I first was allowed to visit. It’s kind of restricted for most civilians, but I was a messenger and therefore had to deliver scrolls to the soldiers stationed here.”

            The wind whipped Percy’s hair, and Jason could only marvel at the fact that it looked like a dark version of Heaven, and he was about to inquire if they were in Hell, but then again Percy had told him that it was, indeed, the second Heaven and therefore it would’ve been an incredibly stupid question to ask. Jason wasn’t exaggerating in the slightest when he said that this place looked a whole awful lot like Hell, though. Instead of white, fluffy wisps there were roiling dark grey thunderclouds, lightning occasionally flashing and illuminating their depths. The air smelled of rain and ozone, and it was bitterly cold, the hairs on the messenger angel’s arms standing straight up as the gusts clawed at them. Percy’s hair would’ve poofed with the static had passing through the wet droplets not plastered it to his forehead, and it felt like he was flying through mist, which he technically was. There was a metallic taste in Past Percy’s mouth as he set off in a direction that was unknown to Jason, his heart pounding inside of his ribcage as he clutched a scroll in one hand, which was tied with a red ribbon and marked by a very intricate seal. Jason would’ve asked what it was, but the bitterness that was seeping off Percy made him decide otherwise. Was there a place to land here? It looked like the clouds went on forever, and Past Percy could barely see through the murky blackness, his wings nearly invisible when he looked over to check on them.

            Then, out of nowhere, two dark figures burst from the clouds, but there was no mistaking the wicked sharp swords that they held in their grasp. The advanced, in unison, the low drumbeat of their wings sounding more ominous than anything else Jason had ever heard. Even he had to admit that he was a little frightened, and even if these guys were just guards, what were they guarding that was so dangerous? Jason was pretty sure that he was more scared of the latter. Past Percy balked, his heart slammed frantically as blood roared in his ears, and he beat his wings to keep him aloft, though the winds made it difficult for him to stay in one place. His flying was labored, the droplets from the clouds making his feathers clump and damp, and it was like trying to fly with two soggy wet towels. It wouldn’t be long before Percy would have to find a place to land or turn back, because he risked plummeting from the sky, and that was never fun.

 _“Who goes there?”_ one of the figures shouted over the bellow of the wind. _“State your occupation and your name or else we will be forced to report you to Uriel under the pretenses of entering restricted areas unauthorized. Your wings will be at stake.”_ A tremor went through both Percys, and Jason felt guilt claw at his heart with serrated talons, though he quickly staved it off before Percy could really get a hold of it.

            _“I’m Perseus the messenger angel!”_ Percy cried. He sounded terrified even to his own ears as he held up the scroll, which oddly enough was still intact despite the violent gusts and damp air. Percy himself was sopping wet and chilled to the bone, and he wanted more than anything to go home and curl up in his bed to go to sleep. This message was important, though, judging from the urgency in Past Percy’s head, and he couldn’t possibly back out now that he was here. _“I deliver news.”_ The two guards exchanged a look, but eventually they nodded.

            _“Come with us,”_ the other grunted, with a distinct Cajun accent.

            “Do angels even have accents? I mean, it’s not like you’re raised on Earth,” Jason remarked, puzzled.

            “Actually, almost all of the accents, not necessarily the languages, that humans have come from angels,” Percy replied, chuckling. “It’s all one big melting pot after another, and it’s very hard to differentiate whether human culture has imprinted on angels or angels have imprinted on humans, though it’s usually the latter. Archangel Gabriel was pretty keen on mortal abbreviations, particularly ‘STFU’.”

            “Shut the fuck up?”

            “Excuse me?!”

            “Dude that’s what it means I wasn't telling you to do it, but I have to admit that your New Yorker accent is killing me right now. I recognized it but then dismissed it and now it’s impossible to ignore-”

            “STFU.”

            Jason laughed out loud, though the giggles quickly died in his throat when the Cajun angel warned, _“And don’t try to take another direction or escape. We know Raquia like the backs of our hands and we will hunt you down.”_

“Raquia?”

            “The name of this Heaven, which is run by Archangel Uriel the Punisher. It’s much easier to just refer to them by which number Heaven they are. The names are derived from the original language; Enochian. Most angel speak human languages, though, and Enochian is taught much like how Latin is, mostly for formalities.”

            “Oh. Is there anything else here?”

            “Well this is the eternal resting place for John the Baptist, so…”

            “John the Baptist like the guy who baptized Jesus?” Jason whispered.

            “The very one,” Perseus replied, snickering at the human’s awestruck tone.

            “Well…what does he do here, exactly?”

            “Mostly keeps to himself in his own little corner, the only part where there are no clouds and the sun shines. I honestly hoped that that’s where we’d be going, but John is a grumpy soul who likes to be left alone, so we don’t bother him.” Jason made a noise in between a huff and a chuckle, his mind conjuring up the image of John the Baptist waving his crook and yelling at snarky young angels to get off of his lawn. Did he even have a lawn? Was there even solid ground? The two lapsed into silence as Past Perseus tried to keep pace with the two guards, but his wings were unused to being so soppy and were practically leaden, unlike the guards, whose wings were propelling them forwards as fast as they would if they were dry.

            “Angels of nature,” Perseus explained. There are different groups, and none of them are ever both. They either control plants, animals, or little parts of the environment like streams or rivers or oceans. These guys are dominant over some form of water, and are practically immune to everything from soggy wings to drowning. It’s pretty awesome. As you know, my dad’s the keeper of oceans.”

            “That is so cool,” Jason replied, and he watched with anticipation as the distance between Past Perseus and the guards lengthened. The messenger angel was quick, though, and he propelled himself through the clouds, his eyes locked on the forms of the two angels soaring in front of him. Jason was impressed; he would’ve given up long ago, but the angel was keeping surprising pace with them, the message gripped tightly in his clenched fist. Jason wondered aloud, “The message you’re carrying is pretty damn fancy, and it’s certainly not from a mother sending a ‘just checking in’ message to her son stationed here. What kind of employer makes you go through with this?”

            “An important one. So important that I’m screening their name from your ears. The words will be altered whenever they are mentioned,” Perseus replied evenly. Emotionlessly. Jason wanted to argue but decided to drop it and avoid further distaste amongst one another; Jason didn’t even deserve this peek at the angel’s life, so he most certainly didn’t have the right to demand information like some spoiled brat. Besides, Percy had sounded on the verge of tears, and Jason was about to ask whether or not they should stop before an island emerged from the fog.

            It was like every video game ever. Jagged rocks and crumbling earth made up the base, as if it’d been torn from the ground and then chucked into zero gravity, and it was bobbing up and down like a sinker as it drifted along. On this island was a small mountain, and Jason could see the reinforced steel walls that encircled the place, topped with razor wire that would put the world’s biggest ball of yarn to shame. Jason felt his panic mount as he anticipated what would lay beyond. Obviously nothing good. A huge, heavy metal door was imbedded into the mountainside, and angels were milling about, not all of them angels of nature. Others were angels of death, some were fire angels (which was a bit counterproductive in the moistness of the Heaven), and some were angels that Jason had never seen before.

            “Angels of power, more properly known as angels of war,” Perseus explained with a shiver.             Referring to a particularly brutish angel that was dishing out orders in some ancient tongue, Percy said, “That’s Ares. He’s the commander-in-chief, so to speak. He, Bellona, and Athena are only a step down behind the Archangels, their power so much greater than that of a regular angel’s. They’ve never been to Earth, thank God, and hopefully there will be no circumstances in which they’ll have to. It would be devastating.” He didn’t elaborate, so Jason didn’t push.

            _“Who is this message from?”_ asked the angel without the accent, looking over Past Percy critically, and Jason felt like he was being held under a magnifying lens by someone who was trying to dissect him, and he technically wasn't the one that the gaze was directed at. There was a long stretch where Jason felt Past Percy’s mouth moving, but he could hear no words, and Jason found it terribly frustrating as the angel’s eyes widened to the size of saucers as they touched down, so obviously it was someone incredibly important. The angels of nature hustled him over to a surly looking female angel with gorgeous baby blue that somehow far too menacing to be considered “baby” blue. Jason could see the muscles rippling under the feathers, and decided that one well-timed blow could snap his neck in half. He swallowed hard.

            Past Perseus knelt respectfully and rose to his feet when given the short, curt word was given _. “Athena,”_ he said evenly, dipping his head. _“How are things?”_ The angel curled her lip, as if Percy’s mere presence disgusted her, and she scowled, adjusting her intricate war helm. Jason was chilled to the bone, and not only physically, as her striking grey gaze locked on him like she could fry him just by staring hard enough.

            _“No less terrible than usual,”_ she scoffed, looking around and crinkling her nose. Damn, did anything make this woman happy? _“The fallen angels are still well and kept until judgement day and they couldn’t’ve possibly been less excited about it. They’re just bored now. We decided to be merciful and slipped a pack of cards in with lunch.”_

 _“Anyone winning?”_ Past Percy asked, trying for humor that Athena most definitely didn’t appreciate. She opened her mouth for a scathing reply when the Cajun guard intervened with a huge grin on his face.

            _“Krios is killing it,”_ he chuckled, _“They’re playing poker with their food and he has about half of everyone’s meal by now.”_ It was then that it seemed to dawn on Jason, and he was pretty sure he was about to go unconscious, if it even was possible in this memory realm.

            “FALLEN ANGELS?!” he cried, and he could feel just how much he’d startled Perseus, who’d been listening to the whole thing intently and perhaps reminiscing. “Like, the real ones?”

            “Of course!” Percy huffed indignantly, and Jason could clearly see in his mind’s eye the messenger’s scrunched-up face. “There are angels and demons and artificially fallen angels, why on Earth would the original group of the fallen not exist? Seriously, man, start thinking with your head and not your geeking-out little heart.”

            “Well that’s one thing you could call it,” Jason snorted. “I’d stay but this Athena chick is seriously freaking me out. She looks so much like Annabeth it’s kind of scary, wouldn’t you agree?”

            “Holy shit you’re right. She’s got the eyes and the hair and everything. No wonder why I thought she was hot, she is the spitting image of the angel of battle strategy, and it’s also pretty weird how she also is the leader of the Golden Swords while Athena is a leader of many legions of angels,” Percy replied, awestruck. “But I can only agree. I had nightmares about her smiting me for a week after this.” The transition to the third Heaven was much easier to adapt to, considering it didn’t involve thunderclouds and fallen angels and Cajun accents and all that other freaky shit.

            In fact, it was quite the opposite. Past Percy was a child again, but this time there was another angel was with him. The black hair that curled around his ears and his dark brown, almost black eyes were all that Jason needed to realize that this was Nico, and another wrench of guilt tore through him that Percy apparently decided to ignore, because he didn’t comment on it. Instead, he announced, “Welcome to Sagun, ruled by Archangel Azrael, and the Heaven that all of you humans know.”

            _“C’mon, slowpoke!”_ Past Percy cried as he raced through the lush wildflowers the ankle-high grasses soothing and soft rather than irritating. _“You gotta catch up if you want to win!”_ He danced out of Nico’s reach as the death angel lunged for him, as agile on the ground as he was in the air.

 _“Stop that, Percy, it’s not fair because you’re a messenger and you’re faster! I don’t like this game!”_ Instead of sounding whiny, Nico’s voice was full of delight as he beat his tiny grey wings in an attempt to speed himself up. Percy’s wings were much bigger and more developed, with Nico most likely being younger, and once again he easily evaded Nico’s attempts to catch him. It was then that Jason realized the shimmering silhouettes that he’d singled out as tricks of the light were actually people. There were tons of them, and they didn’t seem to mind at all as Nico and Past Percy tumbled and rolled in the grass, flapping their too-small wings like hummingbirds and grinning toothily at one another. In fact, they smiled and cooed things at the two baby angels who waved at them despite the fact that their words were indecipherable.

            “Everyone is in their own Heaven,” Percy told Jason, “To them, it’s just them and their close family. One person could be in more than one Heaven, like a daughter could be in bother her mother and grandmother’s Heaven, their essences split. It’s not crowded here at all, though it looks like it from the outside. Everyone sees it differently, though.” Past Percy and Nico were now locked in an intense game of tag, and a few of the children broke away to play, though none of them knew each other and therefore they thought that the game only consisted of themselves and the two angels, despite the fact that there were at least five other kids. Then Past Percy looked up to see four figures standing at the summit of a small hill a little ways off. Three of them were unrecognizable, but Poseidon couldn’t’ve been mistaken for anyone else as he wrapped his arm around the waist of another woman who was obviously a messenger angel. Percy’s mom.

            He could feel the longing tugging in Percy’s gut, and the angel whimpered softly as his past self waved at his parents animatedly, and in return they waved back. It was so peaceful. So domestic. There was a house peeking out from behind them, one that Percy explained was Nico’s house, and they’d been visiting for a few days. Past Percy and Nico were now playing airplanes (even eons before airplanes were invented), but instead of using their arms, their tiny wings were spread way out as they made engine noises and the like. Jason felt terrible.

            He’d wrenched Perseus away from this life, away from all this joy and happiness, and he wished he could turn back time so he could just walk out of that alley and never encounter Perseus in the first place. A burst of affirmation came from the angel, which signaled that he felt likewise, and that only made matters worse as terrible remorse filled Jason’s insides. Percy just watched with yearning as he and Nico played for a few more minutes and then raced each other up the hill, a race that Nico won because Past Percy wanted him to, and joined their parents on a picnic blanket so they could chow down on assorted sandwiches and fruits.

            “Can we go?” Jason asked hoarsely, and he was pretty sure that he’d be crying if he wasn't in this dream world. Percy seemed so content, though, just reliving this happy moment, and he sighed.

            “Are you sure…?” his voice trailed off as his mother placed a wet kiss on his forehead that he ‘Eww’ed at and wiped off, and Jason knew that he was probably regretting wiping off that kiss, because they were numbered and every one of them counts. That only made him feel even more nauseated with guilt.

            “Yeah, I’m sure,” Jason replied softly, and Percy made a sound akin to a quickly smothered sob before the memory changed yet again. “Sorry.”

            “It’s fine,” Percy said shortly, but it most obviously wasn’t. “This is Machen. My home Heaven and run by Archangel Michael. I was still living here before, you know…” Perhaps this whole experience had been a bad idea, because despite its ups there were way more downs where either Jason, Percy, or both were incredibly depressed, and he was determined to call it quits when  the smell of baking reached his nose, making Past Percy’s stomach growl. He was a teenager, as Jason found out when the messenger looked into the mirror, and Percy explained that he was almost in the phase in his life where angels simply stopped aging, which was what he was in now. They could alter their appearance in Heaven, but ultimately they all looked like people in their mid-twenties once they reached maturity.

            _“The cookies are ready, Perce!”_ came a female voice from the kitchen. _“Your father is at work so that means more for us.”_ A jovial-looking woman emerged wearing oven mitts and carrying a tray of delicious-looking chocolate chip cookies that had obviously just come out of the oven, their surfaces still steaming the air. _“We’ll have to wait for them to cool off, but we have to hurry up and eat them so we can go and visit the Garden of Eden later.”_

“The Garden of Eden?” Jason gasped, though he was really unsure of how he was still surprised by these sorts of things in Percy’s memories.

            “It relocated itself to Machen when Earth started to become too populated, making it vulnerable and easy to discover, and now it’s a main attraction aside from the Capitol,” Percy explained, and excitement laced his voice as his past self sat down on the plush sofa across from his mother.

            _“So how was school, honey?”_ she asked, smiling softly. It made Jason bitterly jealous. He’d never had a true mom, or a dad, either, even in the days leading up to when they split. They were constantly butting heads, and she pretended that Thalia and Jason didn’t exist at all, having no excuse for doing so until she turned to the bottle.

            _“It was great! We learned about how we have things that humans couldn’t even dream of having now, and that humans don’t exist yet! The ruling organism right now is the sea sponge! It’s so interesting how they only have a certain amount of time to live, so that they have to make the most of it. It must be scary, being mortal,”_ Past Percy replied enthusiastically, trying for a cookie but then withdrawing quickly as his fingers burned.

            _“Indeed it is,”_ his mother replied, and Percy helpfully supplied her name: Sally. Jason barely remembers what his mom’s name was, and he most certainly would like to forget completely, but sometimes it just pops into his head; Beryl Grace. He used to shut down for the entire day after that, just going through the motions and moving mechanically, but he'd gotten much better about it as the wounds healed, leaving only jagged scares in its wake. _“Are you excited to go to Eden?”_

 _“Of course! We were never able to book a visit because everyone else was grabbing for available slots, but now we can! Dad is so cool for squeezing us in,”_ Past Percy exclaimed. He frowned. _“Too bad we can’t bring Nico with us.”_

 _“Nico’s already seen the Garden,”_ Sally assured, her beautiful dusky wings folding behind her back comfortably. It was probably from her gene line that Percy had gotten his completely black wings, and needless to say that Jason was impressed. _“It’s not like he’ll be too jealous about it.”_

            _“Yeah but he’ll still be jealous,”_ Past Percy replied, and the two angels chuckled heartily. Sally’s laughter was infectious and soft and beautiful, like honey, and she brushed a few stray strands of hair from her face. _“I’m most excited to see the Tree of Knowledge. Did you know that the apples actually didn’t make them smarter? They were just normal apples and God wanted to see whether Adam and Eve would obey or not. That hasn’t happened yet, but still!”_

 _“Very interesting, Percy,”_ Sally chuckled. _“If you’re so smart, then tell me why we can’t see huge events coming until they happen? That we only can see a glimpse and can do nothing to prevent it?”_

 _“How silly would that be, stopping huge events from happening!”_ Percy laughed. _“Or else we would’ve stopped,”_ he looked around before whispering, “ _Lucifer from falling.”_ Back to normal volume, he continued, _“We have no power to stop World War II or the Sun from engulfing and destroying the Earth because it is Fate, and when we try to alter it, it only speeds up the process.”_

 _“Very good. That Mr. Brunner sure is teaching you well_.” Past Percy beamed, and received an equally hearty smile in return. It was heartwarming. There was more mindless chat, most of the time with mouths full of cookie as they finally cooled off enough to eat, and it slowly faded into nothingness.

            “That was the end,” Perseus replied in the blackness. “Now, I’ve been to the fifth Heaven, Mathey, only briefly, and it’s not worth the hassle. But basically it’s the place where God lives.” Jason would’ve spit out his drink if he had one, and he was about to start freaking out when Perseus talked over him, “ _However_ , if I did show you your eardrums and eyes would’ve simultaneously disintegrated as your essence scatters across the cosmos.” Jason swallowed with difficulty. “The Seraphim here are the highest orders of angels, higher than all the Archangels except Michael. They would run the place had they not sung endless hymns for God in his palace in all the languages that once were, exist now, and will be. It’s a bit hard to stomach, even for angels.”

            “Well then I’m glad we’re not going there,” Jason insisted, but he knew that Percy could hear the disappointment in his voice. Yes, staying alive and in one piece was top priority, but he kind of wanted to see the place where God lived. That was cool, but instead he settled for the sixth Heaven, which Perseus had said was called Zebul. Seriously, even though it’s Enochian the names are still hard to pronounce and difficult to remember. Jason forgot almost all of them already, and he hoped there wasn’t going to be a pop quiz or something.

            Wind was roaring in his ears and whipping Past Percy’s hair from side to side. He surged against the gusts, his powerful black wings propelling him through the air, and Jason was glad that they were surrounded by clear blue skies on all sides, unlike in the second Heaven. Past Percy then came to an island much similar to the fallen angels’ prison, except instead of a mountain and high security, the land was flat with nothing on it. Well, almost nothing. Past Percy let out a yelp of surprised as a fiery red mass that was larger than an elephant whipped past, and he was pretty sure that his eyebrows had burned off from the intense heat of it. The mass circled around and hovered in the air, and only then was Jason able to make out the eagle-like shape, with a fiery crest that was dazzling and difficult to look at.

            A gut-wrenching screech ripped through the air, and Past Perseus clamped his hands over his ears, crumpling the scroll in his hand in the process as he tried, with little success, to block the sound out. The scroll had that same red ribbon and that same intricate seal, but when Jason tried to ask he was shut down almost immediately, and the human realized that the angel was simply keeping him from knowing who the person he worked for was, which they’d agreed on somewhere in the second Heaven.

            “That’s a phoenix,” Percy remarked nonchalantly, as if it was an everyday occurrence. “There are seven of them and I can’t really keep count, but I’m pretty sure that this one is named Fawkes, several eons before J.K. Rowling came out with her stupid book.”

            “Hey, don’t insult the Queen of Magic,” Jason chided, “Even if these guys are awesome, Fawkes was a badass.” Percy only scoffed, and Jason could practically hear his bitchface as he seethed with irritation. What made the angel despise Harry Potter? Jason didn’t know, and he really wanted to find out so that he could convince him to try and read it.

            _“Why, hello there,”_ Past Percy said nervously, holding his hands out in a peacekeeping gesture as Fawkes scrutinized him critically. The scroll, surprisingly, didn’t singe in the slightest, and Jason soon realized that he’d greatly miscalculated the size of the bird. Fawkes was about as large as a tractor trailer was long. Needless to say, he was very large. _“Can you take me to Malakai, the head Cherubim?”_ The phoenix actually dipped its head in acknowledgement, and Past Percy thanked it as it took off towards the island at speeds beyond comprehension. Even Percy’s huge black wings were no match for the phoenix’s one hundred foot wingspan, and he was huffing and puffing by the time he landed on solid ground.

            “What’s a Cherubim?” Jason asked.

            “You’ll see,” Percy replied wickedly, and the human would be lying if he said he wasn't nervous. Then he saw it. It was huge, at least twenty stories high, and it looked like it could beat the shit out of him just by looking at him the right way. Past Percy’s mouth dropped open as the Cherubim watched with glowing yellow eyes, holding out its huge hand and letting Fawkes perch on it. It was a lion head on a human’s body, which was mostly covered in a cascading purple robe, with the legs of a calf. It had six wings total, three pairs jutting from just below its shoulders, the bottom of its shoulder blades, and then at the small of its back, all shimmering gold like its eyes. Fawkes hopped to its shoulder, which somehow wasn't charred, and let out another deafening screech.

            _“What is your name?”_ the Cherubim asked, its voice a low baritone like Morgan Freeman’s. It would’ve been soothing had it not looked so fucking creepy for a lion’s mouth to move like that.

            _“P-P-Perseus, sir, a messenger,”_ Past Perseus stammered, letting out a shocked squeak as the Cherubim leaned down and picked him up, letting the angel stand in the palm of his hand as he spoke to it. His voice seemed to make the air around him vibrate, and Jason wasn't liking this one bit. _“I’m assuming you’re Malakai?”_

_“The very one. Now, what news do you bring from-”_

The memory abruptly cut off, and Jason didn’t bother to complain as it switched.

            “This will be brief. I’m starting to…itch,” Percy replied, sounding utterly wrecked. His voice was raspy, and he could feel the anxiety in the messenger angel mounting. Past Perseus was standing on a cliff overlooking a huge building. Cherubim and other angels milled about, the Cherubs with their mighty forms and the angels flitting about this way and that on swift wings. They looked like ants compared to the massiveness of their (cousins?), and Jason was surprised to see some lioness heads and woman bodies mixed in with the brutish males. “This is the seventh Heaven, Araboth, and it used to be run by Lucifer before he turned,” there was a long pause as the messenger simply took in the view as Past Percy gazed about with wonder at the huge, cathedral-like building. “This huge complex is the Guph,” he explained. “It’s where all the souls of the unborn live before they are dispensed into human fetuses. They are heavily guarded and watched over constantly, since souls hold a great power when used correctly or, more accurately, _incorrectly._ A soul burns with the energy of a thousand supergiant stars, and mishandling one can cause devastation beyond compare.”

            “Cool,” Jason remarked simply, just taking it all in. He wished he could see inside, but Past Percy had no intention of moving from his spot on the cliff, and Jason couldn’t help but feel another twinge of disappointment, though he could only think that it was for the best; he already knew too much, why should he take more burdens upon his shoulders?

            “We’re going,” Percy said abruptly, and he sounded like he was in actual physical pain.

            “Wha-?” But everything had already been sucked into blackness.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Jason jolted awake, and he and Percy nearly conked heads as their eyes darted around. The blond-haired boy immediately glanced at the clock, only to see that not even a minute had passed in the real world. Percy looked a little worse for wear, but Jason didn’t really process that as he rushed out of the room as fast as his legs could carry him. Stumbling into the kitchen, he was shocked to find that the cook wasn’t even done making the batter for the blue cookies.

            “Something wrong, hun?” she asked, smiling sweetly as she used a whisk to blend the noticeably azure mix. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

“No, nothing’s wrong. Just checking in,” he replied with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, making her chuckle, and began to the trek back to the guest room. How was this possible? He had gone into Percy’s subconscious world for what seemed like a good few hours. How had only a few seconds passed? He hurried back to Perseus’ room, only now remembering just how awful the ex-messenger angel had looked when they’d awoken, and his heart stuttered in his chest when he saw that the door was closed. He tried the doorknob. Locked.

            “Percy?” he cried, his voice filled with panic as he pulled and jiggled the doorknob.

            “Please, Jason. I don’t want you to see me scrounging for my drug like a filthy worm,” the angel’s voice sounded defeated. Resigned. He’d seemed so happy in his memories of Heaven, where he could fly and enjoy his time as a messenger angel, and at first had been reluctant to leave. Jason then understood why he’d been so eager to get back to the real world towards the end; he needed another fix, and the addiction had probably been killing him. That’s when Jason got an idea. It was a crazy idea, but still an idea all the same. He grabbed his coat and jacket, informed Percy and the cook that he’d be leaving for a while, and ran to his car. After he’d pulled out of the driveway, he began to drive towards the slums, all the way to the Whisper


	12. The Boy Who Would Be King

            Jason felt like he was being molested. No, really; every other minute he spent in the Whisper he had a prostitute draping herself all over him. They were touching him in places that he certainly thought skirted across the line and into the sexual-assault category, and he certainly wasn’t enjoying it. Not in the slightest. If he was called “Pretty boy” one more time, he’d probably whack the hooker upside the head, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to since even the slightest physical violence drove the people here nuts. He was completely and utterly exhausted; he’d been searching frantically and in vain for the one person he knew could fix this whole mess he was in, but the search had mostly been based off of the miniscule hope that this certain person was a regular at the Whisper.  

           

            _Jason held a nameless guardian angel’s wings in his arms, and a few piebald feathers poked out every so often, all of which he quickly concealed within the large blanket. He avoided watchful eyes, sticking to the shadows as not to draw attention to himself, since carrying and concealing two boogie-board-sized objects would certainly attract some prying gazes. The door to where his client was most likely waiting was within sights, and he was just about to slip inside when some premonition made him look back to the dance floor, and he was pretty sure his heart stopped._

_A very familiar face was amongst the hordes of strangers, body swaying with the beat as some random girl grinded on him. He didn’t look that interested, though, instead eying up the guy next to him as the bass of some anonymous song pulsed like a steady heartbeat. Glimpses of black hair and brown eyes that were so dark they were almost black. Jason thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, but after he looked closer he realized that, dancing in the crowd, was, indeed, the very, very old acquaintance he’d been suspecting. He looked up suddenly and their gazes locked, but Jason quickly melted into the shadows before the black-haired young man could register what he’d just seen._

            After shoving off yet another seductive vixen, he began to shoulder his way through the crowd of writhing bodies on the dance floor. The tight space made it even more uncomfortable and invading even though he knew that the dancers, who were mostly drunk, didn’t intend to brush their hands across parts that he preferred not to be touched. The air reeked of sweat and cheap booze and sex, and Jason wanted to hurl right then and there, but he refrained from it as he was sent staggering by a particularly vicious booty bump. He ground his teeth together to keep from spitting something at the offending woman, whose cakey makeup was being slowly sweat off so that she looked like some sort of clown, and grimaced, squeezing through the mob that was packed tighter than sardines in a can.

            He made his way over to the lavish couches, which surprisingly didn’t have stains from spilled wine or puking drunks. There was a plush and fuzzy carpet underfoot, and it didn’t seem to match the wild atmosphere; it looked like it belonged in a kid’s room and not in a casino/night club/strip club/bar. Jason collapsed onto one of the couches, wiping at the sweat that was dripping down his face. It smelled rancid. Completely and utterly rancid. He opted for breathing through his mouth instead of his nose, but it did little to help. It was as hot as hell in here, with all of the bodies crammed together, and by the stench wafting from them, most of them didn’t use deodorant. There must’ve been an air conditioner around here somewhere, but Jason supposed that all of the vents were being used to pumping hallucinogenic stuff into the atmosphere to make sure that everyone was having a good time. Jason’s vision tilted and spun, as if he had had too much to drink, though he hadn’t even gone near the bar, but his thoughts weren’t muddled and his face was only flushed due to the heat. That was probably the drugged air doing its work.

            He grabbed his hair and balanced his elbows on his knees, breathing as if he’d just come from a long run. He knew he couldn’t drive home tonight with his vision blurring like this; he’d have to sleep back at the Golden Swords’ facility, but the thought of rest wasn’t even beginning to touch his mind. He needed to find the person he was looking for, if he was even here. And, by the looks of it, he wasn’t. That’s when Jason looked up and, hallefuckinglujah, he saw exactly who he was looking for, sitting right across from him. Jason would’ve looked in the lounge sooner, but he’d thought that that would’ve been too easy. Apparently, it wasn’t. His mouth dropped open like a door with broken hinges, but he quickly snapped it shut before anyone else could see him gawking.

            Nicolas the fallen death angel had his legs crossed and was sitting on the couch opposite from the one Jason was occupying. Several woman were around him, each one fighting to get his attention, even going so far as to claw at one another with their fake nails so they could have a turn rubbing his pecs or shoulders. All were rather beautiful, at least in the dim, rainbow lighting, but the fallen angel seemed quite uninterested. His dark chocolate eyes burned like coals, and they studied Jason with a slight familiarity, as if he were struggling to assign his face to a name. Luckily, Jason knew that his face had been hidden by a mask while he had chopped off the death angel’s wings, but Nicolas’s corded muscles and excellent build made him a little nervous. His blood ran cold when their gazes locked, and he quickly averted his eyes.

            Nicolas did the exact thing that Jason didn’t want him to do; he shouldered the women off of him, and with promises that he would return he left and stalked over to Jason’s couch. The cushions dipped with the added weight as the fallen angel took a seat next to him. Nicolas was wearing black jeans with a leather jacket and combat boots of the same color. A silver ring shaped like a skull with ruby eyes regarded Jason coldly.  It sent shivers down his spine, and he was trying not to think about the fact that this fallen angel was powerful and could easily snap Jason’s neck then and there, as easily as if it were a toothpick. He was silent for a while, just studying Jason’s face creepily, and the blond was so uncomfortable that he took up flirting with a petite woman who looked Vietnamese but Jason couldn’t be sure…

_Goawaygoawaygoawaygoawaygoawaygo-_

            “I think I know you from somewhere,” Nicolas prompted.

_Fuck._

            The fallen death angel’s voice was as smooth and soft as silk, but held a sharp edge in the undertone, as if there was a knife hidden under the fabric. Jason knew how to handle this question; the Golden Swords had drilled him to perfection and now he knew how to deal with something like this. He studied Nicolas’s face for a moment, as if he were trying to analyze and figure out if he knew it from somewhere, and the black-haired ex-angel waited patiently as Jason sized him up.

_Incredibly muscular, though he looks lanky. Sharp intelligence. Probably incredibly fast._

            After several seconds that seemed to last forever, he shrugged.

            “I’m afraid I don’t know you, err…”

            “Nicolas. But most call me Nico. Sometimes I’m the Bringer of Bereavement,” the fallen angel replied, his expression schooled but no less suspicious. The fear that kicked in made Jason’s brain gears spin when he registered the name that Nico had used long ago.

            “I’m,” he paused, remembering that Nico knew his name. It had been foolish of Annabeth to not use his code name when they were hunting the death angel, but then again there were dozens of Jasons in the world. Just to be safe, he said, “Adam.” He held out his hand for a shake, but was left hanging.

            “Hello, Adam. Fine name, by the way,” Nico complimented, though there really was no sincerity behind it. “Sadly, you are not who I thought you were.”

            “Pardon?” Jason knew where this was going, but he was Adam now, not Jason. He didn’t know that Nico was a fallen death angel, and he certainly did not know that ‘Jason’ had severed his wings.

            “There is this young man, who has the same eyes as you, by the way, and his name was…Jason.” Jason felt his heart quicken at the mention of his name, as well as the bitterness in the fallen angel’s tone. Nico continued, “Jason took, no, _stole_ some things from me, and I need them back. You have no idea how much I want to have a word with him.” The fallen angel cracked his knuckles, and Jason tried his hardest not to flinch away as his heart pounded.

            “I know it’s none of my business, but what exactly was stolen?” Jason knew that he was treading on dangerous ground; one slip of the tongue and he was in deep trouble.

            “You’re right, it is none of your business,” Nico snarled, causing the blond-haired young man to jump a little. Jason was aware of the fact that it was now or never; he needed to get the fallen death angel’s attention and have him follow to a secluded place where they could talk. Jason desperately needed Nico’s help; without it, Percy would die. He leaned in close to Nico before the angel could recoil, his breath fanning across his pale features. 

            “Perseus is here,” he whispered and abruptly stood, quickly walking away as if nothing had happened in the first place. He heard Nico’s gasp of shock that quickly bled into a bellow, and the sound of the black-haired immortal leaping to his feet sent the hairs on the back of the human’s neck standing on end. Jason knew that he had to get to a quiet area before the angel caught up to him, and with Nico’s heightened abilities, he knew he didn’t have much time. He barreled through the crowd, muttering curt and rather pointless ‘Excuse me’s’ as he ran. He heard the death angel right on his tail and could almost sense the clawing curiosity pulsing off of him in waves. He wanted to know how a mortal knew about his friend. He wanted to know where his friend was and why he was here. If he needed those answers, he’d have to catch Jason first.

            “ADAM!” Nico bellowed menacingly. If Jason had told the fallen angel his real name, fear probably would’ve frozen his feet into place, but luckily that only happened to just about every Adam in the Whisper. Jason kept running, the crowd becoming aware of the chase and beginning to part for him. They wanted to see how this game of cat and mouse ended up. Would they see a good fight, or would it become boring as Jason continually evaded Nico’s grasp? The thing was, Jason _wanted_ Nico to catch him, but he couldn’t help but feel like this was the end, judging from the murderous look on Nico’s face when he glanced back.

            His gaze around quickly, searching for a place that would be secluded enough to talk angel, but not too far away to the point that Nico would already be upon him before he got there. He could hear the ragged breathing of the angel as he pursued his blond-haired prey, and it was pretty nerve-wracking. Jason’s eyes rested on a door that had a bright red “Exit” sign hanging over the top. It was teetering on the point of being too far away to reach, but it was worth a shot. Jason used his agility training to aid him as he suddenly shot to the side like an arrow, his arms pumping and his muscles screaming.

            He heard the astonished grunt of Nico as his turn went wide, toppling him into a group of jeering onlookers, who all screeched as the fallen angel shot back with inhuman recovery. Jason’s head began to throb and his breathing became more and more labored, and he was aware of Nico as the fallen angel easily regained the ground that he had lost. Jason wouldn’t be able to hold out for much longer. All he needed to do was get to that door. Time seemed to slow down as Jason leapt for the doorknob, just to find that Nico had grasped the back of his shirt in midair. He managed to wrench the door open, but the fallen angel’s grip was as strong as titanium as he yanked Jason back.

            The former angel hunter let out a cry of sheer alarm as his hands scrabbled for the exit, just to become farther and farther away. He struggled and cursed as Nico dragged him away as if he weighed nothing, which was probably true in Nico’s eyes. The crowd was silent and only the deafening blare of music could be heard. They were all waiting for a fight, and they all expected Jason to be the loser. That was not what Jason had in mind, though, and he deferred to the last option that his training had presented to him: the good old-fashioned groin kick. Thanks, Annabeth.

            Jason squirmed around and brought his knee up, slamming it into the fallen angel’s tender areas, wincing a bit in sympathy. The attack was so violent that Jason was pretty sure that Nico would never have kids, the black-haired angel making a manly squeaking sound and collapsing, which gave Jason just enough time to wriggle free from his grasp. He bolted, heading straight out the exit, which was wide open, and taking in a deep breath of non-shitty-smelling air. He knew that angels recuperated quickly, and that pretty soon Nico would be up and running, so he simply waited in the alley, hoping that the angel hadn’t given up on the chase and enjoying he fresh air in his lungs.

            The stars twinkled overhead, and there was surprisingly little light pollution, though it was mostly because all the damn streetlamps here were broken. His only light came from the changing motley of color coming from the small, high-up windows of the Whisper that had been broken long ago. Jason relished the alone time, finally able to rest without getting hit on by a prostitute or shoved this way and that by the mob of people. He was contemplating leaving, but luckily, Nico was not one to surrender so easily. Jason jumped about ten feet into the air as the fallen angel threw the door open, his head snapping back and forth as he looked for Jason. His gaze finally fell on the blond-haired boy, leaning against the wall with what he hoped was a bored look on his face, examining his nails as if they interested him in the slightest (which they really didn’t).

            “Listen, we need to talk,” they said at the same time.

            There was a bout of awkward silence until Jason spoke up, “You first.”

            “Okay, _Adam._ I know that’s not your real name. You’re Jason. I know you’re Jason,” Nico hissed. “And boy am I gonna-” Jason held up a hand for silence, his demeanor calm, despite the fact that he was freaking out on the inside. Nico knew, and Jason certainly wasn’t getting away unscathed now that the angel had found the culprit who sawed off his wings.

            “You got me. But, this is serious. I didn’t risk getting my ass kicked just for the fun of it. I-” Nico didn’t even let Jason finish, cutting him off with a wicked glare.  

            “How do you know about Percy?!” he demanded. “Answer me now, you little twerp or I’ll rip you’re shoulder blades out, just so you get a feel of how it’s like to get your wings sawed off.”

            “I was getting to that,” Jason scoffed, stuffing his trembling hands into the pockets of his jeans. He hoped that Nico didn’t notice. The death angel was scary as shit. “I know Perseus, but he likes me to call him Percy.” Nico opened his mouth to put his two cents in, but Jason spoke over him, “Percy has a problem. A _big_ problem, and I’m not just talking about the fact that he has no wings.”

            “ _What?!_ ” cue horrified and furious reaction from Nico.

            “Sorry, sorry. My fault. Trying to relocate them at this very moment, and I’ll relocate yours if you want… _anyway_ Percy is in big trouble,” Jason told the already fuming death angel.

            “What could possibly be worse than you chopping his wings off!? Huh?!” he spat. “You think you can suddenly start helping people out as penance, cause it’s not going to work! You finally got it through your little head that the things you do, or did, are giving you a first-class ticket downstairs! And trust me, my father was a very powerful death angel seconded to only Azrael himself, and he’ll make sure that you’re burning below when he finds out what you did.” Nico was advancing now, and Jason swallowed hard and backed up, holding his hands out in a gesture of surrender.

            “Listen, man, that’s not why I started this,” he admitted. The angel didn’t look convinced, but he did stop in his tracks to let Jason explain, though he looked like one wrong word would make the angel pounce and rip Jason’s ribs out. “I realized that what I was doing was bad and I stopped. A long time ago.” He realized that saying he took Percy back to the facility wouldn’t sound very good to the death angel, so instead he said, “I found Perseus again and he was in a really bad place so I took him back to my house. He’s there as we speak.”

            “What kind of ‘bad place’ are you talking about?” Nico snorted, but his eyes were sparkling with interest and perhaps anxiety. “Fallen angels get to some really low places, and they always manage to claw their way back out again unscathed. Percy was strong. He’d be able to do it better than anyone else.” Jason decided that perhaps he’d leave out the part where Percy was tortured and had starved himself for weeks afterwards, settling to tell him later because he really wanted to keep his shoulder blades intact, thank you very much. Perhaps it was selfish, but Jason was considering them white lies. He’d tell Nico the whole story later, when he was less uptight.

            “Umm…are you familiar with angel addictions?” Nico’s complexion paled even further than it already was at this, and his mouth dropped open. Thoughts and expressions flitted across his face as he processed this, and Jason really hoped that he wouldn’t take his shock out on the messenger.

            “Of course,” the anger faded from his voice, replaced by incredible worry. “Why?”

            “Percy…um…err…”

            “Spit it out!”

            “Percyisseverelyaddictedtoheroinandrightnowitiscurrentlyintheprocessofkillinghim,” Jason blurted.

            “Speak English!” Nico demanded. Jason sighed and gave in.

            “Percy is severely addicted to heroin, and right now it is currently in the process killing him,” he sighed. “I don’t know what to do. I’ve never tried to actually take care of an angel before, much less one with an addiction, and he told me that you two were close. So I hoped that you’d be able to come help me.” Nico was quiet for a long, long, time. A few times he opened his mouth as if to speak, and then closed it again.

            “It’s amazing how Percy hasn’t forgotten about me. It’s been so long…” Nico’s voice trailed off sadly. “I used to think that years were meaningless. Mere minutes. But on the ground, it’s so much longer. It’s been…God, I’ve forgotten how long it’s been since I’ve seen him.”

            “When I caught him he had been in the process of looking for you!” Jason cried and immediately slapped his hand over his mouth. Nico’s head snapped towards Jason so fast that the human was pretty sure that the fallen angel had pulled something in the process. Nico stared at him in shock, blinking once. Then twice.

            “He…he…he _what_?” the fallen death angel stammered, his eyes wider than saucers as he buried his hands in his hair, tugging at the long strands. “That’s not possible. Surely he would’ve given up by then, I’ve been down here for _years-_ ”

            “He was looking for you. After you went missing, well, he dedicated his life to one: finding you, and two: killing the person who hurt you,” Jason explained. A ghost of a smile danced on Nico’s lips.

            “Well since you’re here that means that that big oaf wasn’t successful.” he chuckled.

            “Err…no.”

            “Well what are we waiting for? Take me to him or else I’ll throttle you.”

 

\----Ω----

 

            Percy was in a mood, and when angels, especially fallen ones, got into “moods” you better stay the hell away. Jason had left a little while ago, leaving him alone to stew in his own juices, which was certainly not a good idea for a fallen angel who had a lot of emotional baggage. He paced agitatedly back and forth across the room, _his_ room. It was nice to think of it like that, and for a moment he calmed down, but his thoughts soon got the best of him. It occurred to him that the last time he’d paced like this was when he’d attacked Luke and gotten himself into this huge mess, but he stuffed that thought into the back of his mind before it was able to fester. Percy knew that he wasn’t technically locked in his room, but he was pretty sure that Jason wanted him to rest rather than wander around the house aimlessly. A growing sense of ease settled neatly within his gut as he regarded his room, and it was one of his first positive emotions that had occurred outside of the stroll down memory lane with Jason.

            He felt like he belonged here, for once. The walls were painted a pretty pale blue, and his bed was pushed against the wall across from the door, right under the window. If he was sitting in bed, which he was supposed to be doing as of that moment, he would be able to have a beautiful view of the beach. It was his father’s realm. It always made him feel at home. His father couldn’t see him now, though, and neither could his mother, and that made him feel lonely beyond compare. Sure, he had Jason, he supposed, but he was a human and couldn’t really sympathize with him despite seeing all of his memories. Not saying that Jason was beneath him (which he’d tried to think in the beginning but had utterly failed), it was like having a dog as your companion. It was fun, and a great companionship, but the dog couldn’t really understand you wand what you’ve been through. It could only comfort based off of your emotions that it senses, completely ignorant of the ones that it doesn’t.

            Before he could figure out what he was doing, he was slipping out of the room. His legs were weak, and he’d tried to exercise them by pacing around, but it’d done little good. He soon realized that he hadn’t actually stepped foot outside since Jason had carried him from the Golden Swords’ headquarters, into the car, and then out of the car to the house, and he hadn’t even been conscious for that. He was growing pale, and he was getting uglier as the drug anchored its roots firmly into the fallen angel’s body. Perhaps a nice tan would counteract his sunken eyes, chipped fingernails, and stick-like arms. The cook was almost done with the blue cookies, but he bypassed the kitchen in favor of searching for the back door, which he might never find since this house was so fucking big.

            He didn’t get lost, thankfully, and was finally able to find the back door in a den with plush furniture and a shaggy white carpet that must’ve been a bitch to clean. He gazed around warily, making sure that there were no prying eyes (because he didn’t want a maid or something to call Jason and have him come back; he needed alone time), and slipped outside. The sea washed over him like a nice, comforting wave, and it reminded him of what his father smelled like. He wouldn’t allow himself to cry, not yet, as he made his way down the steps and onto a large patio with rocking chairs and tables. The cobblestones were still hot as the sun blazed overhead, especially for the fallen angel’s bare feet, but he didn’t mind much as he made his way down another set of steps and his feet sunk into soft sand.

            The sand was hot, too, but it was a nice kind of hot as the Percy made his way down to the private beach, which was empty except for the seagulls that circled overhead. Dunes flanked the narrow path on either side, with tall grass chutes springing up from the ground and swaying lazily in the slight wind. The dunes eventually gave way to flat beach, and Percy sighed softly as he was comforted by the smells and sounds of _home._ The seagulls scattered when Percy approached, and he would’ve been dark with jealousy as they took off into the sky on trusty, nimble wings, but he wasn’t. He was just…peaceful. There were no lifeguards, and Percy wished he’d brought a towel as he plopped down on the sand in nothing but boxer shorts, though the discomfort was very minor compared to everything else.

            The late afternoon sun wasn’t overbearing, since it wasn’t really summer yet, but nevertheless it was beautiful California weather. It was low tide, so the waves weren't violent in the least, but Percy didn’t dare take a dip lest he freeze to death; California water was pretty damn near freezing, and that was in summer. Who knows what would happen Goosebumps cropped up on his arms, but he disregarded it and kept his eyes trained on the water. Boast floated off in the distance, huge barges transporting goods from on far place to another, and the gulls shrieked overhead, finally settling down on the ground but casting wary glances back at Percy. At this point, had the fallen angel had his wings he would’ve spread them out to let his plumage catch the wind; not flying, just enjoying the feeling of air ghosting over his feathers, which he liked to do a lot on the upmost balconies of Michael’s palace.

            Time slipped away as Percy just sat there, watching the waves and enjoying himself. His mind was blissfully and mercifully blank as he watched the waves crawl in and then recede back into the mass of churning froth. Eventually stars emerged, and Percy was exhausted and incredibly content, the only problem being that he needed another fix. He reluctantly rose to his feet and began trotting back to the house, which loomed ahead like a fortress overlooking the water, and Percy could see the window of his room from where he walked, the sand having long since gone cold. He fell like he needed a shower, and his hands wouldn’t sit still as his blood began to chant for more heroin, and he felt like a puppet as he slipped back into his room and obliged, injecting the deadly amount that he was used to and collapsing back onto his bed. He shifted and tossed, but couldn’t manage to get comfortable.

            Percy knew one thing, though; wings, even wing _stumps_ , were a nuisance. Every time he laid down to rest in his room that resided in Archangel Michael’s house, it was one thing or another that kept him awake. A feather was tickling his nose. He was too hot or too cold. He got pins and needles in his wings. It was uneven when he slept on his back. His left wing was poking out of the blanket and letting all the cold air in. It was molting season and black feathers were all over the place. It had gotten to the point where Percy had considered hanging from the rafters by his feet and wrapping his wings around him like a bat. He was running out of air, but he wasn't panicking in the slightest as he slowly

            _Jesus Christ_ , Percy thought, his lungs too empty for him to form words, as he flopped onto his stomach. When he had wings, lying on his stomach would cause a bombardment of fuzzy down, the most useless feathers in the world that would act as insolents if he was a bird (which he most obviously was not), to rain upon him like gunfire. After he’d sneezed roughly twenty times, he’d screw it and begin to toss and turn again. Thankfully he didn’t have wings anymore, and so he was able to get comfortable on his stomach as every ounce of his air slowly left him, but he knew that less sleep was only a slight price to pay for having wings. He missed his wings so much, so gut-wrenchingly much that they might as well have been people who'd died, and finally his diaphragm seized up and the Healing Slumber claimed him.  

 

\----Ω----

 

            “He might be resting,” Jason warned Nico as he closed the door behind him. The fallen death angel flicked on the lights and the grand entryway. A twin staircase went to the second floor, where Perseus was hopefully asleep in his bed, and a gigantic chandelier hung from the ceiling. Nico whistled, looking into the first room that branched off and coming face to face with one of the many living rooms. Jason and Thalia didn’t hang out in this one much, because there were much better ones, but they did use this one to entertain important guests, so it was a parlor of sorts, complete with a mini-bar in the corner and huge, arching windows.

            “You sure have money,” Nico snorted as he examined the sheer size of the parlor and the expensive décor. There were plush couches and a geometric rug, complete with a fireplace and a huge Samsung 110-inch Ultra HDTV siting at an angle off to the right. It was rather modern, with dark blue walls and a Baxton Studio coffee table, along with abstract art and statues placed sporadically around the room.

            “My sister’s salary, mostly. I’m just a waiter,” Jason replied as they withdrew from the parlor and back to the entryway, where he placed the keys on one of the many hooks by the door. The fallen death angel arched an eyebrow at this. “Okay, fine. A waiter at a five-star Italian restaurant called the _La Fiore Bella_.” Satisfied, Nico turned away from him and began to scale the steps, a look of wariness and wonder glittering in his mocha eyes. Jason hurried after him, struggling to keep up with Nico’s long, purposeful strides. His walking was Jason’s jogging, and the fact that he was most likely a body builder and had immortal strength and eternal youth probably contributed to that.

            “Which room?” Nico asked gruffly, scrutinizing all of the doors that led to bathrooms, guest rooms, master bedrooms, and dens. He completely disregarded the incredible view of the ocean that the large windows were offering him, and Jason admired his loyalty to his friend. It was late now, almost one according to the grandfather clock, and the human laughed when he saw that the cook had politely left the blue cookies outside of the door. Nico didn’t seem to notice, staring at Jason expectantly, and the human questioned the fallen angel’s common sense.

            “Third one on the right,” Jason replied. The fallen death angel walked over to the door Jason had directed him to and, after eying the plate of blue cookies strangely, gently turned the knob. Jason scooped up the plate and followed Nico as he stepped inside, hoping that the messenger angel was awake enough to eat them. His hopes were dashed when he saw that there, lying on his bed, was Percy. Jason could register a sharp intake of breath from Nico, but Percy was fast asleep among the covers, his breathing gently rustling the black locks that had fallen into his face.

            He looked so peaceful and at ease, though Jason knew was lay behind those eyelids; green eyes like shattered glass, the eyes of an old man on a young man’s face, sunken and devoid of all hope. He’d seen too much in too little time, and now it was pushing down on him, seeing how much pressure it would take before he crumbled altogether. Jason took one look at the pouch on the end table and cursed himself for not purchasing more heroin for the poor angel at the Whisper. But then again, his addiction was the reason why Nico was here.

            The fallen death angel approached the bed and knelt beside it, watching Percy sleep soundly for a few moments. With a gentle touch that Jason would have never associated with him, he shook Percy awake. “Perce. Perce?” he whispered softly, his brown eyes full of tender affection. The messenger angel’s eyes fluttered open like the beating of a butterfly’s wings, his long black lashes casting shadows over his eyes.

            “Nico?” he asked in a voice so quiet that Jason could barely hear. He suppose that this was a private, intimate moment and that that was his cue to leave. Just as he turned to walk out he heard Percy murmur, “No, stay.” Grudgingly, Jason pulled a chair from the corner of the room, a chair that he had spent many hours sitting in by Percy’s bedside, and watched. A faint smile tugged at the angel’s lips and he took a deep breath, closing his eyes. His movements were so feeble and weak they would’ve been associated with a person who was taking their final breath.

            “The gang’s all here,” he chuckled lightly and Jason couldn’t help but smile. Even Nico was warmed by Percy’s humor.

            “What has happened, Percy?” the fallen death angel asked. At this the smile faded from the messenger angel’s face and was replaced by a pained expression.

            “I’m sorry. I am a fool, a fool for ever thinking that this drug could help me. Now it is only killing me. I injected it once and now it had become a part of me; part of me that would cause the other parts to wither and die like a sickly animal if it ever disappeared,” he sighed, his voice sounding rather defeated. Jason immediately felt defensive; it wasn’t his fault that he had used the drug during a time of extreme stress and agony for him. But then again, that’s how almost all drug addicts were created. “Please. Don’t make the same mistake I did.”

            “Stop talking as if you are already gone!” Nico demanded, rising to his feet. His expression was stern, all of his features pinched in frustration.

            “I cannot die,” Percy replied. “But I will go into the Eternal Healing Slumber. I’ve been seeking it out, Nico, and I’ve been in more Healing Slumbers than you could ever imagine. I never know when the next overdose will make me fall asleep for good.” At this, Nico’s expression became uneasy, his brows knitting together as he ran a hand through his hair.

            “Nonsense! That is but a myth; a child’s tale to discourage young angels from joking around with drugs,” he hissed.

            “What do you mean by ‘Eternal Healing Slumber’?” Jason questioned, his tone anxious.

            “It’s just a-” Percy cut his friend off.

            “In the Book of Enoch, _our_ Book of Enoch, not yours, it is mentioned that angels have a very…weak immunity to certain mortal drugs,” the messenger angel explained, struggling to sit upright. Nico assisted him in propping him up against the headboard, a bunch of pillows pooling behind his back to support him. Percy continued, “Legend has it that once your body shuts down, which would be when a normal mortal dies from the drug, you do go into the Healing Slumber…only that from this slumber you do not wake up.”

            “As I said, it’s just a child’s tale. Only Archangels are permitted to examine the pages of the Book of Enoch, and I doubt they would keep this information from us if it had been true.” Nico snorted, but his voice still wavered.

            “I was a messenger for Archangel Michael-”

            “What?!” Jason cried, his voice an octave higher than usual. He clamped his hand over his mouth as the two fallen angels turned to stare at him, looks of amusement written all over their faces. The overwhelming fear and astonishment washed over Jason like a wave. He had chopped off the wings of a messenger for Archangel Michael? He’d thought Archangel Gabriel was Michael’s messenger, but then again he was just a mortal; he was still only grazing the surface of what the divine lived like, even if Percy had taken him into his subconscious memories. It explained why the angel had masked the Archangel’s name from the memories; he didn’t want Jason freaking out like he was now and getting all worked up.

            “Y-y-you…you…God. I can’t even…good Lord,” the moral muttered and paced back and forth, pinching the bridge of his nose and closing his eyes. He stopped and turned to the snickering companions almost robotically. “So let me get this straight. _You_ were a _messenger_ for _Archangel Michael?!_ The right-hand man of the Creator? The guy who holds the keys to Heaven and Hell and cast Satan himself down into the Ninth Circle?”

            “That’s the one,” Percy chuckled, bemused at the mortal’s flabbergasted expression.

            “Should I be, I don’t know, groveling or something?”

            “That would be nice,” the messenger angel remarked.

            “And hysterical to watch,” Nico added and they both shared a laugh. Jason felt a twinge of jealousy; he’d never had friends that close, even when he was with the Golden Swords. Their laugh was the laugh of old friends that had been together for many years; they knew each other’s secrets and could read each other’s expressions like a book. Jason didn’t think he’d ever find a companion like that.

            “Haha, very funny,” he managed. “I think we should get down to business, wouldn’t you agree?”

            “Of course!” Nico said quickly, gathering himself. “I think I may have a solution, but it’s not fool-proof.” Percy and Jason’s heads snapped towards him in unison, as if they were two automatons being controlled by the same remote. The fallen death angel shifted uncomfortably from his seat on the floor, but managed to maintain his poker-face. “Well there’s this healing angel. She’s been fallen for many, many years and has taken up a job in a hospital that, surprisingly, is nearby. She fell on purpose; she did something, I don’t know what, so she’d get caught and cast out of Heaven. I don’t know what she did, but that’s not the point; she didn’t like her Calling as a Healing angel. She thought she would be better as an angel of art and beauty, and you can’t change your Calling.

            “There are some who fit perfectly into their Calling, for instance I’m a death angel to the core just like how Percy is a messenger angel at heart, but others don’t seem content. They envy, which is one of the seven deadly sins, mind you, other angels’ jobs; healing angels’ whole lives are dedicated to giving and not getting anything in return, and some aren’t fond with that. You can’t switch, because that’s against our laws.

            “So she fell on purpose and now resides here in one of the hospitals as one of the head nurses. Even though she doesn’t like it, it’s what she does best,” Nico told them.

            “So what can she do?” Percy asked, his voice containing a spark of hope.

            “As a healing angel, she can cure just about anything. Maybe she can deal with your addiction, Perce,” Nico replied.

            “So who is this healing angel? What is her name?” Jason questioned, optimism pumping thorough his veins and carrying throughout his body. He was confident that this wrong would be set right again, and with this healing angel he could get Percy back on his feet again. Nico turned to Jason, his brown, almost black eyes glittering in the light of the dying sun, which filtered through the windows.

            “Piper. Her fake mortal surname being McLean. She is Piper, Piper McLean.”


	13. Sands of Time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the long update. Please forgive me!

            Mercy Hospital couldn’t’ve been any more terrifying than it already was. It was six stories of white brick that stood out like a sore thumb within the wash of grey that was the inner metropolis. The skyscrapers around them were all sleek glass and concrete, power-washed often and nothing like the crumbling and decrepit buildings in the slums, though this wasn’t the same city; this one was much closer to Jason’s house and didn’t provoke a long drive, which was simultaneously both a blessing and a curse, since Percy really wanted to delay this for as long as possible. The sky was cloudless, a beautiful day for such a grim event, and the angel shivered when he realized that inside that hospital there were _dead_ people. There were dead and dying and comatose in this building in front of them, and people were milling by as if none of this horror was going on, though their muted human senses were inferior and therefore unable to detect these things. Mercy Hospital was run by the Clergy, according to the huge crucifix hung over the double doors, which Percy didn’t find a surprise in the slightest, considering that Nico’s contact, Piper McLean, was most likely a fallen angel. The only problem was, she wasn’t an artificially fallen, she was one of the true fallen, one who’d had her wings ripped out by Archangel Uriel and cast out of Heaven for misdeeds. Would he be able to get back to Heaven if he associated with her? He didn’t think he had a choice.

            “Is this going to be painful?” Percy asked nervously as Nico and Jason stepped out of the car. The parking was terrible, but at least the hospital was isolated enough from the real clamor that it actually had a large radius around it for parking and small, insignificant trees and gardens and shrubbery. He was terrified of the doctor, a fear that he had had since he was young. Even in Heaven he feared that the healing angels would stick him with needles to make him “feel better”, having extensive knowledge on what mortal doctors did, but the healing angels never did such things. In fact, the only thing that healing angels really did was lay their hands on him and then he’d feel better, which was why nobody really was ever injured in Heaven (That meant no sick days, though, which sucked ass more than any healing angel’s needle). Percy smiled wryly at the thought; there were needles that could heal and needles that could tear your life to pieces, and he’d witnessed, and was witnessing, the latter firsthand.

            After a hardcore rock, paper, scissors tournament, Jason had won the privilege of driving while Nico sat shotgun, though he grumbled the entire time. Besides, Jason knew the city like the back of his hand, whereas Nico would have to take directions from the blond-haired boy, which would take longer. Percy was incredibly glad that he hadn’t been able to sit in the front; he was feeling like crap, and it wouldn’t be good if he barfed on Jason and then they hit a bump…Ew. The nausea wasn't even the worst part, though; his muscles were incredibly weak and his head was throbbing to the rhythm of his heart, pulsing with pain on every _ba-boom_. His stomach was doing flip-flops and his mind was roaring for more heroin, but he’d taken his the last of his supply before they’d left. It hadn’t even been enough to put him in the Healing Slumber, and now he was just sluggish.

            His mind was muddled, as if it were stuffed with balls of cotton, and his heartbeat was dragging along, which was sort of a blessing since it made sure his head wasn't pounding _too_ badly. It was incredibly hard to breathe, though, like his lungs were trying to fail but he hadn’t injected enough to call for an overdose. Perhaps he had developed a tolerance to it after all, like Luke said he might. Percy tried to ignore the worried glances that Nico threw back at him, and the way Jason kept checking in the rearview mirror as the angel he rasped and hacked and wheezed. His every breath was rattling, and it took effort just to get his chest to rise and fall, his head lolling back against the car seat when they finally pulled up to the hospital.

            Percy had missed Nico’s reply to the question that he’d asked, which he’d long since forgotten, and it didn’t really matter though as the addiction surged through his veins, making him moan a bit as he struggled to stay coherent. It was a losing battle. When Jason and Nico realized that Percy couldn’t get himself out, they walked over to the passenger door and opened it up, unbuckling the struggling angel and helping him steady himself. He was barely able to step out of the car before stumbling, and Jason moved swiftly to catch him before he smacked his head against the concrete, and Percy was dully reminded of the fact that this blond-haired, blue-eyed boy was a soldier. He moved through the air like it was smoke and treaded as lightly as a cat, maybe even lighter, and he was like a phantom of sorts. Percy wanted to accuse him of being the descendent of Zeus, an incredibly powerful angel of nature who would control wind and could appear wherever he wanted to by bending the air to his will, but he was too tired to do so.

            “Thanks,” the fallen messenger angel managed, his mouth and throat as dry as deserts and his tongue feeling more like sandpaper than anything else. Nico’s face was pinched with worry, and he was pacing back and forth like a caged panther as Percy leaned on Jason for support, his frame a bit too slight against the human’s to be considered healthy.

            “C’mon, c’mon,” Nico muttered impatiently and trailed behind Jason as he helped lug Percy towards the huge double doors and the crucifix above it. The hospital loomed in front of them, its clean windows and white paint emphasizing its sterility, and Percy’s stomach sank as he felt the powerful energies of souls ascending, and it must’ve been even worse for Nico, who used to be an angel of death and worked with souls on a regular basis. Nico would be able to pick out which soul was which, but Percy just felt the overwhelming aura, though he cursed his bleary eyes and addled thoughts that made it impossible to pick out what was what. Piper McLean was supposed to be working in this hospital at the moment, and her shift would end soon. When she walked out, the three had planned to take her off to the side to speak with her, but with the side-effects that were clearly being put into motion against Percy’s wilting form, they had no idea how much time he had left.

            “I think I might be sick,” Percy groaned, clutching his stomach as it began to gurgle unhappily.

            “Well, be sick in the bushes and not on me!” Jason hissed and hustled his friend to the nearest shrub, where the fallen messenger angel unceremoniously threw up violently, his sides heaving. The vomit burned Percy’s throat and mouth, and he was pretty sure that it wasn’t supposed to hurt this badly. Luckily, there was no one around as a witness, since visiting hours weren't until five and the staff was just in other places. People sure would be questioning the horrible smell that was rising from the undergrowth, though, and humiliation burned almost as much as his stomach acid burned his throat, tinging his face red. Jason rubbed Percy’s back, carefully steering away from his wing stumps but still making sure the angel got everything out. It was a kind gesture, really, but Percy was too delirious to truly thank him for it. Nico was standing off to the side from the double doors, his brow crinkling as he continued to tap his foot impatiently while he waited in suspense for Piper McLean to emerge.

             Percy hadn’t known Piper very well when she was a healing angel, since she usually hung around with her siblings Lucy and Mitchell, but he did know of her. She was a troublemaker, that one, always stealing things just for the fun of it but then returning them later. There was no true malice behind it, so Uriel couldn’t punish, but it was only a matter of time before her crimes caught up to her. Together, Piper, Mitchell, and Lucy were healers, since it was in the family name of McLean; they were distantly related to Archangel Raphael, the first angel of healing, with him being their great-great-great-great-great-great second cousin or something. The siblings was so tightly knit that not even Piper’s falling could keep them apart; as healing angels, they sometimes had to descend to Earth to gather roots and herbs, and during that time, Lucy and Mitchell would pay Piper short visits. It was only a curt exchange of news and catching up with each other, but it was enough to land them a spot on the ground with Piper, and therefore they always departed quickly. He’d learned this from Mitchell himself, who worked in the infirmary at Michael’s palace and had trusted him enough not to blab about it to the head Archangel himself.

            “It’s the addiction,” Percy rasped shakily, a bout of dry-heaving wracking his body. “It’s punishing me for not injecting another dose.”

_You need the drug._

_Right here._

_Right now._

_More._

_More!_

_MORE!_  the addiction bellowed, clawing at Percy, the weak host that it had resided in.

 _I don’t have any! Leave me alone!_ Percy cried out desperately into the darkness, but it just kept advancing.

 _THEN GET MORE!_ It screeched. The fallen angel felt tears drip down his face as the pain grew worse and worse. His muscles screamed, though he had not been running, and began to seize up, nearly making him collapse in the puddle of his own vomit. Hot spikes of agony impaled themselves into his head, a dry desert wind scorching his throat. His vision tilted and blurred, the addiction chanting for his demise since he hadn’t fed it, and he crumbled to his knees, his heart working overtime to pump blood, which was devoid of drug, to his brain. His sides heaved as he gasped for air, and he was aware of the muted shouts of his companions, along with a single not-so-familiar voice. He felt hands shaking him, and he knew his eyes were open, but all he saw was darkness. Darkness and fear and pain. He struggled to fight back the blackness that was pulling at his feet, but it was too strong. He collapsed onto his side and let the unconsciousness overtake him.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Percy’s eyes fluttered open, his lashes casting shadows over the dark smudges under his eyes. He tried to rise, searching for Nico and Jason, but a gentle yet firm hand settled his head back onto the pillow. The hand stroked his hair and massaged his aching shoulders and neck, and he let out a content sigh as he relaxed back into the mattress, which was surprisingly comfy. Percy let his eyes close once more. He was vaguely aware of the sterile and uninteresting white sheets that were housing him, and they smelled of…nothing really. They were clean as could be and still warm from the dryer, just how he liked it. He yawned, making a sound between a whimper and a puppy’s squeak. He heart an amused huff from somewhere to his right.

            He rested like that for a few moments, the hand that had been playing with his hair was now gripping his, stroking the soft skin above his knuckles gently with their thumb. But the curiosity won out over the will to relax, and reluctantly he opened his eyes, which felt leaden as he forced them to cooperate. He was greeted by the haggard expressions of Nico and Jason, who both looked equally bedraggled and concerned, along with one unfamiliar face. She was rather beautiful, with choppy brown hair and eyes like a kaleidoscope that kept changing colors and shades, and she was the one who was holding his hand. This must have been Piper, and only now did he realize why she thought her Calling would be better as an angel of art and beauty.

            Percy caught Jason staring at her, a lovesick look on his face, and he chuckled a little, which turned into a wince as the small laugh made his sides hurt. “Interesting,” was all Piper remarked, as if Percy was some sort of science experiment she was regarding, though she threw an accusing glance back at Jason. The blond continued to stare, obviously attracted to her, before their gazes locked and he quickly poised, his cheeks flaming.

            The angel took a moment to look around the room, which was about as good as a hospital room could get. There were huge windows to the right of his bed, revealing the parking lot that lay beyond. The hospital was by no means large compared to the surrounding skyscrapers, but at least the view was nice rather than clustered, the door to the hall on the left of Percy’s bed and the huge wall of windows to the right. The walls were painted a sterile white, and a crucifix was hung below the television. It was private and spared some explaining to the roommate, thank god, but the real question was how much Jason paid for it. It must’ve cost an arm and a leg….or a wing. He tried not to dwell on it.

            “How long was I out?” Percy managed to croak, his mouth quirking as Jason worried at his bottom lip and tried not to stare at Piper for too long. Poor human; he was probably infinitely attracted to this angel, who was purposefully emitting hidden pheromones just to fuck with him, judging by the amusement in her eyes. Luckily, Nico was hardly straight and Percy didn’t really think that Piper was his type. Was it terrible that his mind immediately diverted to blonde hair and striking grey eyes? Shit, he was in trouble.

            “A few hours,” Jason sighed, running his fingers through his matted blond hair, and he finally seeming to have gotten over his infatuation with the angel, considering she’s stopped emitting pheromones as Nico and Percy gave her disapproving glances. Now Percy didn’t find it as much of a surprise that this particular angel was no longer a part of Heaven’s ranks. Percy managed to crane his neck and glance out of the window, and sure enough the sky was a deep indigo, unlike the darkening baby blue it had been when they’d arrived. Everyone’s face was etched with deep lines of worry, even Piper’s, under all that playful mischief.

            “I had to give you quite a bit of morphine to stop the pain. Even then you were whimpering in your sleep,” she whispered forlornly. “The morphine will have a few…unpleasant side-effects, but as a fallen angel you shouldn’t have to worry about addiction; for that to occur I would’ve had used way more.”

            “And the other addiction? Am I cured?” Percy asked, even though he knew it was pointless to do so; he could still feel the wrenching pull in his gut as his body demanded it, but the pain was far more muted than it had been before. Like the voices were trapped behind a resilient wall of glass that would eventually crumble as they persistently slammed against it, Piper took a deep breath and closed her eyes, and Percy’s stomached dropped. That wasn't a good look at all. That was the “I’m sorry but you have type four cancer” look that all doctors had before they delivered the news.  

            “The only way to get you off your heroin addiction is to get you addicted to something else; even then you are at risk of being addicted to two drugs at once,” she whispered so softly Percy had to strain to hear. Even then, it was as if she had shouted. The realization slammed into him like a wave, shattering his hope into tiny pieces and then stamping on the remains.

            “So there’s no cure?” he asked, his last shred of hope disappearing like a far off memory. Piper didn’t reply, nor did she meet Percy’s wide green eyes, which were brimming with tears.

            “It’s impossible. There is only one cure to everything, and that’s if you cross the border between Heaven and Earth; people who had died of Malaria would automatically be healed and people with schizophrenia will be able to separate the real from the fake. You’d need your wings, though-” Piper was cut off as Jason leapt to his feet, a brooding expression on his face that automatically set the entire room on edge. Percy knew that expression; it was the expression of a man who had a plan. It may have been a crazy and nearly impossible plan, but it was better than doing nothing.

            “I sold his wings,” Jason managed to gasp in between shuddering breaths, though his blue eyes were sparkling like diamonds. “I sold it to something that certainly wasn’t human.”

            “Well, tell us about her, ASAP,” Piper demanded, producing a note pad from her scrubs. “Your friend’s life is on the line, here!” Jason must’ve felt incredible pressure on him and Percy’s eyes were as wide as saucers as he, Piper, and Nico regarded her with critical, if slightly hopeful, gazes. His forehead crinkled as he tried to remember, pinching the bridge of his nose and screwing his eyes shut as he wracked his mind for important details.

            “Um…I didn’t know her name, but her hair was chestnut-colored and she was wearing black lipstick,” he paused, grinding his teeth together. “Err…she had these really realistic bat wing tattoos that were just,” he made wide hand gestures, searching for words but then eventually giving up “ _Really_ realistic. Her eyes were black like Nico’s, only more sinister. Like she wanted to gut me and eat my heart. Um…” he wracked his mind again but came back with nothing, shrugging helplessly as he cast a desperate look from Nico to Piper to Percy. Percy didn’t have a clue of who Jason was talking about, but he automatically hated her for buying his wings, color him biased. She could be kind for all he knew, completely oblivious that those had actually come from a real living being (he doubted that, though), but that was no excuse at all. She still bought them, and judging from the way Jason described her, she knew exactly what she was in for.

            Piper didn’t seem to know the client either, but Nico had paled to an even milkier white than before. “You sold Percy’s wings to _Lilith!?_ ” he squeaked, which sounded slightly amusing due to the fact that it was coming from a man as buff as Nico. Percy’s heart stuttered, and he opened his mouth but no words came out. How was that possible? Lilith had been damned many millennia ago, and she still had more time to serve before she crawled out of that pit of hers…

            “Why? What’s so special about her?” Jason asked innocently as the horror began to show on Piper and Percy’s faces, and his face was pinched with worry. The fallen angel could tell that he was if only slightly relieved and ecstatic to have a lead on Percy’s wings, his tone brimming with hope that had since been crushed within Percy. Like the ex-messenger angel’s optimism, Jason’s would disappear all to quickly as the three of them turned, expressions of utter defeat written all over their face.

            “Oh nothing,” Nico said shakily, his nails digging into his palms, “She’s only Lucifer’s wife, no biggie.”

\----Ω----

           

            “I don’t want their help!” Percy cried, trembling all over. He hugged his knees against his chest and hid his face behind them. Jason, Nico, and Piper were attempting to reason with him, to compromise, but he was having absolutely none of it.

            “We’ll leave Luke behind, okay?”

            “What if only Reyna and Leo come?”

            “Surely Dakota and Gwen weren't _that_ bad.”

            “No, no, no, no, no, no, no!” Percy cried, shaking his head frantically. “I’m not listening to you! Shut up!” Jason let out an exasperated sigh, dragging his hands down his face as the fallen angel denied every one of their suggestions. They were making quite a racket, so much so that a few doctors poked their heads in to check if everything was all right, to which Piper responded in a tight voice, “Peachy.” Her smile was so forced he was pretty sure her cheeks would break. They were so nice. No dimples, and her teeth were practically radiant…

            _No! Have to stay on task_ , Jason chided, and he was pretty sure he was going to go ape-shit on Percy. He’d told Jason that the Golden Swords, minus Luke, had treated him nothing less than kindly, even in his times of need, but for some reason he was adamantly refusing for them to help get his wings back. Jason was unsure of whether it was because they were angel hunters or because he didn’t want them to be in danger; this was a big task, after all. Jason tried not to dwell on the fact that they probably wouldn’t make it out of this alive, instead trying to come up with other suggestions that would sway Percy in his favor.

            “But Annabeth is there! Annabeth is good, right?” he pleaded, exhausting his last bit of leverage. . He had gone from firmly demanding that he cooperate to begging in mere moments, and if Percy refused this one then there was no hope left for the operation. But at least the topic of Annabeth had gotten the fallen angel interested; his trembling stopped and a green eye peeked out from behind his knees, which acted like a barrier between him and everyone else, a sort-of “I can’t see them so they can’t see me” strategy.

            “Annabeth?” he repeated, tasting the name on his tongue. Distantly he added, “She was very nice.” A tidal wave of relief smacked into Jason as Percy’s body slowly unfurled into a more approachable position, and the blond thanked anyone and everyone who was listening that the ex-messenger angel finally was able to

            “That’s my point! We can get Annabeth, Dakota, Gwen, and Will-” Nico cut Jason off.

            “Wait a minute. Who?”

            Jason made a growling sound in his throat, still at his wit’s end and incredibly tired of Nico’s antics, and repeated it mockingly slowly, “Annabeth Chase…Dakota…Gwen…Will Solace.”

            “Will Solace is an angel hunter?!” Nico yelled abruptly, his eyes full of disbelief. If it was possible, he’d paled even more, and Jason kind of felt bad for one surprise after another, though he didn’t understand what all the fuss about Will Solace was about.

            “Yeah, why?” he asked, quirking an eyebrow and frowning.

            “I’m _dating_ that guy!” Nico cried. “We’ve been together for three months and I didn’t know! Then again, he doesn’t know I’m a fallen angel. Well, at least I _think_ he doesn’t know…” His voice trailed off and he began to mutter incoherent things in what Jason was pretty sure wasn’t English, and when he looked at Percy and Piper, who were pursing their lips tightly in their attempt to not laugh, they simultaneously mouthed _Enochian._ Jason thought this was pretty funny, but then again it was kind of morbid. An angel, and an angel of death, at that, whose wings were cut off by an angel hunter unknowingly began to date an angel hunter. That must be rough for him, and Jason put a reassuring hand on the fallen angel’s shoulder. Nico gave him quite the withering look as he ran his hand through his hair, the expression on his face clearly stating: _I have made a terrible mistake._ There was silence for a few moments as everyone stared at the fallen death angel, who was shifting his weight from foot to foot, muttering apologies. Nobody cared that he was dating a guy, but Nico was flushed tomato red as he gave them all a tight smile.

            Then, out of nowhere, Jason said absently, “No wonder why you were rejecting those gorgeously hot and curvy women back at the Whisper. Damn, I’d thought you were out of your mind.” A roar of laughter followed, but Percy’s chuckling was masked by a fit of violent wheezing. Everyone rushed over like mother hens as his body was racked with ferocious coughs that made his entire body shudder. Percy’s hand flew to his mouth and came back red, and everyone inhaled sharply as they reached out, but Percy waved all but Piper away from him, feigning bravado as his eyes projected his fear to the room. The fallen healing angel took out a cotton swab and cleaned Percy’s mouth of all the blood, and Nico wiped off his bloodied hand, clasping it between his own. Percy was so ghostly that their skin tones almost matched, and Jason swallowed hard when he realized that he was the one responsible for this.

            “Jason Grace, don’t you dare start throwing yourself a ‘this is all my fault’ party in that head of yours or I’ll skin you. I’ll work with them,” Percy rasped, barely managing the words as a little more blood dribbled onto his chin, which was quickly and expertly wiped away by Pipers skilled hands. The agony that he had to go through to say the words evident on his face, and he was hushed into silence when he tried to speak again as Piper checked all of the monitors and did a routine check-up, frowning as she listened to his lungs. Not good. She rummaged around for a moment before she slipped an oxygen mask over the angel’s face, her face set and professional as she ignored the inquiring looks from everyone else. Percy took several deep breaths and his eyes fluttered closed, hiding the green behind his eyelids.

            “Drugs?” Jason asked quietly as he watched the fallen angel’s labored breathing, the way the machines monitoring his lungs were flashing yellow and beeping, which Piper soon silenced with the click of a button.

            “I didn’t want to see him in pain like that,” Piper replied softly, casting a pitying glace over at Percy’s limp and lifeless-looking form. “He’s been through a lot. This whole thing better be worth it, boys, because he deserves the world.”

            “I agree,” Jason replied hoarsely as he watched Percy sleep. Had the heart monitor not been beeping steadily and the blankets Piper pulled over him not risen and fallen with each of Percy’s shuddering breaths, the human would’ve thought him to be dead. It wasn’t a pretty sight, and he swallowed hard, refusing to dwell on the remorse after Percy had specifically told him not to.

            “We can’t go to the Golden Swords without him,” Nico pointed out, wringing his hands in his lap.

            “Yes, we can. All we have to do is bring them here, minus Luke of course. Piper can stay here with Percy,” he turned to the gorgeous fallen healing angel, “If that’s okay with you, of course.” Piper nodded gravely and watched as Percy’s heartbeat was shown on the monitor. _Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._ It was horribly slow, and it made Jason all the more desire to help him.

            “Luke will find out, you know,” Nico growled. “That scoundrel won’t just ignore the whole rest of the Order going somewhere without him. Let’s just hope that he’s out doing Luke stuff so we can slip out.

            “That’ll be hard, but I’m up to the challenge,” Jason replied, but his face was pinched with worry. Nico nodded, a whole whirlpool of thoughts churning in his head as each one flashed across his face for a mere moment before diverting to the next. Rage, disgust, and fear were all evident, and without a word the fallen death angel left, and only then did Jason notice that his feet didn’t make a sound as he left. He was like a shadow. A ghost.

            An angel.

             Jason turned to follow him, very much plunged into his own little chaotic mind as he assessed tactics they could use, but was halted at the threshold when Piper called out softly, “Wait.” He turned to see her furiously scrawling onto the note pad that they’d used to write down Lilith’s description, which would’ve been funny had the mood not been so solemn. She handed it to him, and the human peered down to see numbers printed neatly on the lined paper. “When this whole dilemma is over, call me. We should hang out.” She leaned in, and before he could process it, she kissed his cheek lightly, a sheepish smile touching her cheeks, and they were both aware of how deeply they were both blushing. It was almost as bad as when Nico found out that Will was an angel hunter. “I think you’re cute.” Despite the incredibly inappropriate timing and the extremely dire situation at hand, Jason grinned and dashed out, tucking Piper’s number into his pocket and calling for Nico to wait up.

 

\----Ω----

 

            “ _This_ is the Golden Swords’ headquarters?” Nico scoffed incredulously, regarding the broken windows and crumbling bricks of the long-since abandoned apartment building.

            “No, it’s more… _under_ the building,” Jason replied curtly, trying not to take offense at the fallen angel insulting his home of many years. The only way they were seeing was because of their superior sight; the street lamps were either broken or flickering wildly, like fireflies under attack, but Jason had long since gotten used to it, though Nico was regarding the darkness warily. A crumpled newspaper skidded and cartwheeled by, making scraping sounds against the pavement, and the new moon hung darkly in the night, with roiling grey clouds smothering it from time to time. A flicker of movement in the window caught Jason’s eye, probably the sentry (a new job that Annabeth had just created for the Golden Swords) whose shift it was. No doubt they could see their approach, but it made it no less eerie to see someone in the window of a supposedly abandoned building. He squared his shoulders and strode into the alley, hoisting himself on top of the dumpster just like the old days, and he couldn’t help but feel a pang of homesickness. Despite the fact that he was glad to be out of the slums, he’d still lived here at one point in his life, and it was a place that he held dear to his heart despite all of the horrors concealed inside of it. He raised his hand, ready to perform the special knock for entry, but stopped.

            “What are you waiting for?” Nico asked indignantly.

            “It’s just…last time I was here I found Percy with a needle in hand and a pouch of heroin by his side. Who knows what I’ll find now?” he replied quietly, his gaze distant. Nico didn’t object to this and waited patiently on the ground and Jason’s hand, trembling violently, knocked five times.

            “Isn’t that the knock that Ana does in Frozen during the song ‘Do You Wanna Build a Snowman’?” Nico snickered, concealing his smile behind his hand.

            “So what if it is?” Jason grumbled, but stopped when the window unlatched and was thrown open gracelessly. He was met by the blond-haired blue-eyed newbie, who must’ve been the one who Jason had seen in the window. He’d been hoping for Gwen or Annabeth, since they’d be calmer about the muscular, handsome, Goth-reject fallen angel standing behind him, and Will would probably freak out to see his boyfriend at his job, which was very classified.

            “Oh hey-wait, _Nico_?” Will spluttered, rendered speechless by the odd combination of acquaintances. His head moved back and forth rapidly, looking from Jason to Nico and back again. “What the hell are you doing here?”

            “You never told me you were an angel hunter,” Nico growled, but the fury in his voice sounded rather halfhearted as he forced himself to try and stay angry. Then again, he had his secrets as well. The only question was whether he was willing to tell them now. Nico launched himself onto the dumpster with inhuman grace, a panther stalking through the trees on light feet, so that he was eye-level with his boyfriend. His feet hadn’t made a sound as they’d connected with the dumpster’s (rather loud) cover. Jason tracked Will’s Adam’s apple as he swallowed hard, and began to close the window, but Nico grabbed it from the other side and threw it open, breaking the lock in the process. “You wouldn’t lock me out, would you?” he asked, giving him puppy dog eyes. The blond-haired, blue-eyed boy, who, by the way, Jason thought was inferior to his blond-haired-blue-eyed-ness, sighed and stepped away from the opening, allowing Nico and Jason to wriggle through. The sill bit into his stomach more than usual, and Jason wondered if the rich foods of the wealthy were making him pudgy.

            Will regarded Jason with a frown. “You just _had_ to bring him here and tell him, didn’t you?” he hissed, which was very un-Will-like. The former angel hunter snorted, causing his nostrils to flare slightly. “How do you even know him?”

            Jason ignored the last question, instead opting for saying, “Well he hasn’t broken up with you _and_ , since he’s a fallen angel, that’s a major trust factor to your relationship. Congrats, you just reached Level 2 on the relationship scale. Go change your Facebook status or something.” He smirked as Will’s mouth dropped open and he exchanged an amused glace with Nico.

            “You’re-” he began.

            “Yeah, it just sort of happened,” Nico replied with a shrug, his face flaming. “Don’t pity me, though. Pity just makes it worse.” Composing himself, Will cracked a smile, though the shock and denial was still fairly visible on his face.

            “I won’t pity you, don’t worry. I don’t really hunt, anyway. I’m just a medic, but I think that, fallen angel or not, you’re still cute,” he replied with a flirtatious wink. Jason rolled his eyes so hard he was pretty sure they would come out of his sockets, and he placed his hands on his hips as he harrumphed.

            “Get a room, guys. I could go talk to Annabeth while you two do the nasty if you want.” That comment did the trick, for the two lovers, who were closing the space between each other, immediately flew apart, flushed colors that were normally reserved for fire trucks and tomatoes.

            “Why do you need Annabeth?” Will asked. “And why the hell did you steal Percy?”

            “Steal?” Jason scoffed. “Bitch, that was a rescue.”

            “That’s fair,” Will said with a shrug. “But why do you need to see Annabeth?”

            “Err…we have a problem,” Nico said slowly. His boyfriend paled a bit at that.

            “What kind of problem?” he questioned carefully, as if he really didn’t want to know the answer, but was asking due to the fact that it would be the option that was more socially acceptable. Jason didn’t blame him for being so hesitant.

            “A-fallen-messenger-angel-who-is-addicted-to-heroin-is-dying-and-the-only-way-to-heal-him-is-to-get-him-back-to-Heaven-but-his-wings-have-been-bought-by-a-psychopathic-wife-of-Satan sort of problem.” Will didn’t ask any more questions after that. Silently, he gestured for the two to follow him down the familiar stairs. Jason was used to this certain pathway, but Nico was looking around in disgust at the utter wreck of the place. The peeling paint, the creepy crawlies, and the cracks in the walls weren’t sights to behold, but still familiar all the same as he recalled the memories that were inlaid within this place.

            We emerged into the meeting room and Nico ground his teeth together when he saw the huge white wings that were in the case. “When did you get those?” he asked curtly.

            “About ten years ago, as Annabeth and the others tell me,” Will replied nervously. “Why?”

            “Those are Travis’s wings,” he muttered, mostly to himself, his eyes distant and filled with grief. Jason gave him a pitying look, but ushered him along as the group made emerged into the main hall, where all of the other rooms branched off of.  They tried to thank and dismiss Will, but he insisted on staying with his boyfriend and, with the stubborn gleam in his eyes, Jason didn’t bother forcing him out. Will held Nico’s hand and the look of the two of them together was quite endearing, not to mention…right. They fit together like pieces of a puzzle. Surprisingly, Will was the taller one despite the fact that Nico was, indeed, a fallen angel that was supposed to be intimidating and all-powerful, and it warmed Jason’s heart to the point where it might as well be boiling in a vat. He shipped it. He shipped it hard, and because of that his To-Do list was growing insanely long.

            Nico, Will, and Jason walked in silence, sort of like a funeral procession. Nobody else greeted them on their way to Annabeth’s room, and Jason was beginning to become worried. This hush was very unusual; he didn’t hear Leo trying to use percussive maintenance to get one of his inventions to work, he didn’t hear Dakota yelling drunkenly at the flat screen in his room, he didn’t hear Gwen muttering to herself in order to organize all of the wings in the trophy room, and he didn’t pick up the slightest sound of either Reyna, Luke, or Annabeth chopping down dummies in the training room. There was only silence. The headquarters seemed foreboding and not at all like the home that Jason had viewed it as only weeks earlier.

            “Her room is here,” Jason told the two boys, having no idea why he was whispering. Will gave Nico a small peck on the cheek and ran off to his room, his footsteps echoing throughout the hall like gunshots. Nico gazed after him longingly, pure adoration written all over his face, but when he saw Jason staring he quickly regained his composure and nodded to the human who raised his hand and knocked on the door of Annabeth’s room. For a horrifying moment there was no reply. They waited one second. Two seconds. Three. It took exactly twenty seconds for Annabeth to open the door. Her serious grey eyes poked out from the crack between the door and the wall.

            When she realized Jason was there, she sighed dramatically and opened the door as if the world was forcing her to do so and if not she and many others would perish. She opened her mouth to speak or, hopefully, explain, but then she saw Nico and her mouth dropped open like a door with broken wings. “Hey!” she exclaimed in astonishment. “I know you!”

            “Yeah. Fallen angel. Got wings sawed off by you guys,” Nico replied, his voice strained. Annabeth was rendered speechless, and dark guilt flickered behind her eyes for a moment, but then it was like watching someone put on a mask. Her face was cleansed of all emotion, leaving a blank, expressionless one as a replacement, and it unnerved Jason to absolutely no end. Critically analyzing them for a moment, she stepped aside and allowed them into her room, which Jason had only been inside a handful of times. He could probably count it on one hand. 

            Annabeth was wearing a plain orange T-shirt with the words ‘Camp Half-Blood’ written across the front in faded black writing, probably the memorabilia of a childhood sleepaway, though he couldn’t help but feel inquisitive at the Greek-style lettering and the rearing pegasus in flight. Her jeans were ratty, and her combat boots were worn, but they all clearly screamed Annabeth, which Jason found a comfort as he regarded the cold face of the one who wore them. Her sword hung at her side, three feet of iron so pale and polished it looked like bone, whose serrated edges made it look like a dragon tooth, perfectly capable of slicing Jason to ribbons. The sword wasn’t alone, and along with it came her holster, complete with a 10 mm Glock that she stole from a cop, and her assortment of daggers that slapped against her thighs as she moved. She was armed to the teeth and deadlier than a snake poised to strike, her eyes just as piercing as a serpent’s.

            “Where’d you get that?” Jason asked, gesturing to the shirt and trying to bring out the Annabeth that hung around without strangers, not the strict professional one that would probably scare the crap out of Nico, who already looked very unnerved. It worked, thank God, because she looked down at it and blushed furiously. “Oh, it was just an old camp I went to when I was younger. You learned about Greek stuff and things like that.”

            “Oh. Okay,” Jason replied awkwardly, and quickly covered it up by saying, “We have a problem.” Same vague announcement that he’d used with Will, but it was useful.

            “Us as well,” Annabeth replied, visibly grateful to get down to business. “Even though we all agreed to let Percy go, Luke wasn’t in on it. He went in to check up on him,” Jason and Nico exchanged a look that clearly stated that that wasn't all that Luke wanted to do, “and found him missing. He freaked out, and we had to act panicked too because we weren’t supposed to know where you were. To Luke, your four-day stay was cut short as you and Percy disappeared into the night. He thought Percy had captured you and was taking you to an alley to kill you.”

            “Correct, but we have a dilemma that is, no offense, greater than yours-” Annabeth cut him off.

            “Do you know where Luke is?” she asked, looking over his and Nico’s shoulders as if there were a third person behind them.

            “What do you mean?” Jason replied, clearly confused. “No, of course we don’t.”

            “Luke, he didn’t come to you?” Annabeth was beginning to sound very panicked, and she started to pace back and forth across the length of the room like a caged tiger.

            “No. Was he supposed to?”

            “Yes! He set out to your house to find you and Percy, just to make sure that he wasn't torturing you or anything.”

            “Percy torturing _me?_ ” Jason scoffed, incredulous. “Annabeth, you should’ve seen how weak he was when I carried him, dying slowly from the heroin that Luke gave him, into my house.” Annabeth ceased her pacing and turned chalk white, her eyebrows shooting up to her hairline.

            “What?” he voice was wavering. So she really did care about the fallen messenger angel after all, and Jason understood that they’d grown close during his absence.

            “Right now he’s in the hospital with one of Nico’s friends, Piper, and he’s teetering on the edge of having to go on life support,” Jason replied icily, though he immediately softened his tone afterwards, “But he agreed he’d work with the Golden Swords because I mentioned you.”

            “Oh, Percy,” she whispered, her eyes becoming glassy as her stony façade crumbled to pieces, but she blinked the tears away and composed herself. “So what do you need us for?” she asked, her voice now filled with a hard determination. “We’re willing to help in any way, shape, or form.”

            “The only way to save Percy is to get him over the border between Heaven and Earth, since that border heals everything,” Jason explained urgently, the story short and to the point so they didn’t waste precious time.

            “But he needs his-” Nico cut Annabeth off.

            “We know he needs his wings,” the fallen death angel told her darkly, his dark brown eyes glinting with a resolute light. “And we’ve tracked the person, more like _thing_ , who bought them.”

            “And who would that be?” Annabeth questioned, crossing her arms. Nico took a deep breath.

            “Lilith, the wife of Satan himself. Now and then demons escape from Hell purely by luck, and they roam around the Earth until an angel patrol finds and kills them. But this is Lilith we’re talking about; she can make herself look like a human, and she can even _turn herself into_ a human altogether. As a human she would completely be skipped over on the patrols’ radars,” he stated, mostly thinking aloud to himself.  

            “That’s why we need your help to get the wings back, for Percy’s sake,” Jason finished. “We need all the help we can get. Just know that….we probably won’t make it out. There’s a very slim chance for survival, but Piper was right when she told me that Percy deserves the world.” Annabeth worried her bottom lip between her teeth, running a hand through her hair as the gears whirred inside of her skull.

            “But I thought Percy was immortal,” she exclaimed, her brow furrowing. Her complexion had paled all throughout Nico’s story, and her hands were clenching and unclenching at her sides when they weren’t mussing her blonde curls.

            “He can go into the Eternal Healing Slumber. It may supposedly be a myth, but even if it is, Percy would only be suffering at the hands of the drug for the rest of his immortal life,” Jason replied gravely. Annabeth’s expression hardened.

            “Well what are we waiting for? Let’s go kick Satan’s wife’s ass.”

 

\----Ω----

**Jason Grace’s To Do List:**

 

**_Step One:_ ** _Find Annabeth_

**_Step Two:_ ** _Get her and the other members of the Golden Swords (Besides Luke) to help them get Percy’s wings back_

**_Step Three:_ ** _March into Lilith’s super-secret evil hideout/laboratory all badass-like and take back the wings._

**_Step Four:_ ** _Sew Percy’s wings back on_

**_Step Five:_ ** _Announce “Release the Kraken!” and throw Percy off of a tall building *note that if Percy is unable to fly and hits the pavement and dies add a step Five and a Half: Mourn and beat yourself up and turn to heavy alcoholism for a month and then get over yourself*_

**_Step Six_ ** **:** _Call Piper and date her_

**_Step Seven_ ** **:** _Make Solangelo T-shirts_


	14. The Valley of Death

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! I am in a particularly good mood so I whipped this chapter up for you guys. So, without further ado, I present to you a chapter whose plot I just thought of as I’m writing this.

            Wind buffeted the five figures as they emerged from the decidedly shady strawberry van that was parked outside of the beautiful mansion. The air held the tang of an oncoming storm, with an occasional droplet here and there, but just on the brink of becoming an all-out downpour. The swell of clouds gathering above blocked what little sun they had left in the chilly months of autumn, and the trees lost the rest of their leaves to the violent gusts that stripped their branches bare, making a grab for the figure’s coats and hair but unsuccessful in carrying them away. They were lucky that they didn’t have umbrellas, but they cast wary glances at a lone crow, which watched them from atop the skeleton of a tree with beady black eyes, hunkered down against the wind that screamed in their ears.

            The Golden Swords gathered in front of Jason’s house, which contrasted with the smudgy grey sky that stretched behind it. The crow was seriously freaking Annabeth out, because angel hunters became incredibly superstitious as to prevent their already bad luck from getting worse, since crows meant death, and death was bad; it just meant that there was less time between now and the fires of Hell that awaited. Nobody seemed particularly enthusiastic to get inside, even if it meant getting out of the cold that nipped at the cheeks and noses, and Annabeth squinted as she studied the house with a much trained eye. There was no car in the driveway, for one thing, and Annabeth was pretty sure that Jason was rich enough to afford more cars than the one Thalia took to her gig at the Grammies. The windows were dark, absolutely no light emanating from within that signaled towards some sort of life, and all of the curtains were drawn as well. It looked like it was abandoned.

            Annabeth shuddered against the cold and glanced at the slip of paper Jason had handed her. This was definitely 132 Olympus Lane, the number shining next to the front door, just as he’d written. If that was the case, why did it look vacant? She turned and gazed back at her companions, who looked just as anxious as she felt. They were all probably thinking the same thing as her; was this a trap of some sort? Jason had “switched” to the angels’ side so to speak. Who said he wouldn’t seek revenge for the way that the Golden Swords had treated Percy? Then again, the desperation in his and Nico’s voice as they told them of their problem sounded genuine; either that or they were expert actors, and from experience Annabeth had learned that Jason wasn’t a very good liar.

             Nico was the wild card, though. As unpredictable as the future and just as mysterious, not to mention a hell of a lot creepier than your average human being. He was a fallen angel, and a fallen _death_ angel, at that. He’d been ripped away from Heaven, his family, and his wings at the hand of the Golden Swords, and there was really no true way to foretell how he would react; Annabeth had never encountered any of her victims afterwards, but needless to say the response probably wouldn’t be pretty. He had to have some sort of grudge, right? Was he taking advantage of Jason’s big heart and guilty soul in order to manipulate him? Then again, Will was his boyfriend, and Annabeth was pretty sure that killing all of his friends wouldn’t be very proactive towards their relationship with one another. But what if Nico was just pretending to like will? What if Nico slaughtered them all as a message to stop hunting angels?

            Annabeth shrugged the thought off as if it were raindrops on her coat, knowing that if she got too caught up in the ‘what ifs’ she’d undeniably back out of this whole thing. With a swift hand motion she gestured for the others to follow her, parading down the cobblestone path that led to the door with faux confidence written into every muscle. In her peripheral vision she could see the snarling, twisted trees and the crow watching her, and in front of her she saw the house looming, a lone and abandoned specter that wasn’t supposed to be like this. God, why did this path give her such a long time to sink into her thoughts? Because she was seriously considering turning tail and running away.  She sensed Reyna, Gwen, Leo, and Dakota trailing behind her like shadows, their eyes wary and every step hesitant. They were practically radiating fear, and no matter what they couldn’t keep their eyes off of that damn crow, who was some distance away now but had turned to watch as they hiked towards Jason’s house. Talk about fucking creepy.

            She was being torn apart by two warring sides of her brain, and it wasn't very pleasant as she constantly switched back and forth from one decision and the other. On one hand, she could soldier into the house fearing no evil and join Nico, Percy, and Jason on a nearly impossible quest to defeat Lilith. She would help Percy get his wings back and most certainly become closer to the messenger angel in the process, but it would be risking the lives of both her and her friends. On the other hand, she could chicken out and call it all off, despite what protests she received. She would herd her companions back to the strawberry truck and drive far, far away, staying safe but at the same time signing Percy’s obituary. The two halves were ripping each other apart with facts and statistics, and they were currently at a stalemate, unable to advance as their opponents held their ground.

            The game changer was when Annabeth pictured Percy’s face.

            He was beautiful, even when covered in blood, and his eyes, even though they held so much pain and suffering, could still hold shreds of hope and devotion that couldn’t be compared to that of anyone else Annabeth had ever met. Her heart overpowered all, melting into goo when she saw the small smile that he’d had on his face when Jason had carried him away, unconscious. She hadn’t seen him smile much after Luke, and she hoped to God that there was a chance that he would survive. Annabeth was well aware of the fact that even the thought of loving him was ridiculous; he was a fallen angel, one who was trying to get back to Heaven (whose rules clearly stated that dating humans was a no-no), and Annabeth was an angel hunter who’d helped Jason cut off Nico’s wings. Despite her care for him during those hard weeks, he probably hated her for that. Yet despite these cold, hard facts, she couldn’t stifle that little voice from her heart, whispering to her: _Just maybe. It could happen_. But her brain knew that her heart was an idiot. It was show time.

            The blonde-haired girl marched up the steps and onto the stoop, where she stood for a few moments just staring at the polished wood of the door. Her anxiety threatened to get the best of her, rising up and clouding her thoughts, but she fought it back, banishing it as fast as it’d come. Chin held high, she rang the doorbell, and was acutely aware of everything; from the sharp intakes of breath from her companions to the first torrent of rain that fell from the sky to the shape of the crow silhouetted against the tree. She was conscious of it all. The group waited in an anxious silence as nothing seemed to happen. The house remained dormant, which was exactly what Annabeth had feared. She resorted to the secret knock, just in case they wanted confirmation that their visitors were safe, but then again if they didn’t answer to the doorbell they most certainly wouldn’t be able to hear the knocking.

 _Do you wanna build a snowman?_ she sang silently in her head, but it did absolutely nothing to soothe her frayed nerves. She shifted her weight from foot to foot and even tried to peer through the windows on either side of the door, but thick, heavy curtains were blocking the interior from view, and she hoped that they weren't concealing a gruesome murder scene of sorts. And boy did her imagination take that idea and run away with it. She considered breaking in…

            “Let’s go,” Dakota stated nervously, wrenching her from her musings as his eyes darted around. He took a generous swig from a flask he’d brought along, though instead of whisky he’d filled it with wine, and it was clear that the redness on his cheeks wasn’t just from the cold. “I’m getting a little creeped out-” The door flew open and Jason poked his head out, his blue eyes shining like shards of ice as rain pounded on the roof of the porch like a fist, demanding to be let inside. Lightning streaked across the sky, followed by a rumble of thunder, and a particularly violent gust nearly sent the group sprawling. With a nod he invited them wordlessly inside. The dull thrum of the rain on the roof was slightly comforting, and combined with the tinkle of the chandelier it made the nearly empty mansion seem lived in. Annabeth knew they had no time to marvel at the lavish décor as Jason began to scale one of the twin staircases that led to the second floor, but despite this she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of envy.

            She’d lived with her mother, her father, and her two brothers. Well, stepmother and stepbrothers. Her father was too caught up in his twenty-four-seven work schedule to pay any attention to her, the pay was horrendous despite the hours, and was oblivious to the obvious abuse that was going on in their home. The bruises on the arms and faces of her and her stepbrothers certainly weren't from hitting the corners of the table or falling down the stairs, and the drastically hardened gaze of their stepmother, whose eyes crossed and uncrossed as she inhaled lines of white powder on the table a few times a day, was always directed at them when their father asked about how they were doing. They couldn’t tell. They never would. And that's why Annabeth ran away. To help her stepbrothers and her father out of that hell disguised as a home.  When she visited, the place was always a terrifying mess. The garbage can was overflowing. There was a fine layer of dirt and grime covering the floor and furniture. Her stepbrothers’ broken toys, which hadn’t been broken by them but by their mother, littering the ground like broken dreams. The awful smell that came from the shoddy bathroom. The stains on the floor that just wouldn’t come out.

            Worst of all, Annabeth would always find her stepbrothers cowering in their room, hugging one another and trembling all over, their ratty clothes too tight, even for their small and frail frames. Annabeth would always take it upon herself to clean up, even if her mom was a dreadful druggie and would trash the place sooner or later. She would take out the trash, mop the floors, dust the furniture, scrub a little more at that stain to see if it’d weakened a little, and altogether it would take a few hours tops. She would take much time fix her stepbrothers’ toys, which they’d had since they were infants and had never been replaced, and would them an ice cream cone or two. Her stepbrothers adored her, and her father would be grateful, but her mother wouldn’t speak to her, just regard her with a cold and distant gaze that sent shivers up and down her spine. It reminded her of the days when she controlled her, when that look meant no dinner.  The house would stay clean for the duration of her visit, and then when she left and came back it would be the same as it had been before. She wanted her stepbrothers to come with her, but she knew that they were too young to handle the reality.

            They were too young to even begin their training and she doubted she’d be viewed as a hero when they learned about just how she earned the money that put the food on the table, the money that bought them those ice cream cones. All of her cash, every single penny, was spent on her family, and her mother just kept spending and spending money that they didn’t have to give. The bills would come back higher every year, and her father was cracking under the strain. Unlike Jason, Annabeth knew that she’d never be able to retire from angel hunting if it meant her family would starve in the slums.

            “Earth to Annabeth?” Leo’s insistent voice snapped her out of yet another bout of reveries. “You okay, girl?”

            “Yeah, yeah. I’m fine,” she mumbled and waved him off, though he didn’t even look remotely convinced. She and the rest of the Golden Swords followed Jason as he crept down the hallway, which was dark like the rest of the house. She wondered if the power was out or if they’d just been too busy to turn some lights on, and in the shadows she couldn’t discern what color the walls were or what smudges were what furniture. Jason was ignoring all this, instead he was concentrating on treading lightly, his brow furrowed and his tongue poking out slightly between his lips. Annabeth supposed she should be doing the same, and almost immediately her feet stopped making sound as they touched the floorboards, which would’ve been creaking and groaning if she hadn’t been specially trained. Her companions trailed behind like lonesome ghosts, near-spectral as their footsteps went silent as well. It was a little unnerving to feel their presence behind her but not hear them, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood straight up. Even Dakota, who was buzzed and on the brink of drunk, wasn’t walking like he had elephant feet. In fact, he was the quietest of them all.

            The huge windows were mostly dark, but occasionally lightning flashed, casting squares of light onto the floor that disappeared in seconds, and illuminating the forms of the teenagers who slunk past. The paintings that hung on the wall just seemed like blotches and hazes of dark colors, the scenes they depicted obscured until the blazing light of the lightning lit them up. Someone hit into something and a string of curses ripped through the silence, and the quiet that remained afterwards was like the one that seemed to linger after a dying scream. Annabeth shivered, and not from the cold.

            “He’s in here,” Jason whispered and turned to them. In that moment another bolt of lightning split the sky, illuminating only half of his face and concealing the other half in ghastly shadows. His blue eyes were diamond shards. Annabeth recalled him saying that storms made him more alert, calming him and making his senses more acute. She always found that to be a very odd thing about him, since it was the exact opposite of everyone else.

            “Why are we whispering?” Gwen asked, not mocking in any sort of way but more anxious than anything else. Her voice was meek, and her gaze was locked on the dancing shadows, which retreated momentarily before a roll of thunder. They might as well have hidden demons within their depths, judging from the look on her face.

            “Percy’s asleep,” Jason replied, evenly, but Annabeth saw just how the mere mention of Percy made his brow crinkled. He was worried out of his mind, but he was doing an excellent job of hiding it; she was only able to discern the anxiety from the emotionless mask because she’d become excellent at reading people over the years.

            “We came all this way-” Annabeth hushed the rudely drunken Dakota with a glare. He probably didn’t see it, but anyone with a half a brain could _sense_ an Annabeth glare and immediately shut up or face certain destruction.

            “He needs rest,” she told him in her best I’m-very-angry-at-you-but-we-need-to-talk-quiet whisper. “He’s been through a lot.” Jason gave her a grateful look and she returned it with a nod of acknowledgement, knowing fully well that even though Jason was a natural-born leader, sometimes he needed the help of the superior to move him along. The blond-haired boy carefully twisted the knob of an unsuspecting door and let it swing open silently, not even the slightest creak coming from the hinges. He gestured for everyone to follow and they all shuffled inside, careful to keep their movements subtle and quiet. Annabeth realized immediately that this room was occupied, for a large candle was flickering in the corner, illuminating the room with a golden glow that swayed with the dancing of the flame. Her footsteps became even more muted as her shoes connected with carpet instead of wood, and she just couldn’t help but be wrapped in the cozy feel of _home._

            There were three figures waiting for them, shadows dancing across their faces in the candlelight. Nico, his piercing dark brown eyes glittering like coals, was stooped down next to the bed where Percy lay. He clutched his friend’s hand protectively and scanned everyone’s face as if they were enemies, like a panther crouched and ready to leap. The fallen death angel was pale, and his black hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat. If he hadn’t looked as if he were prepared to strike at any given moment, she would’ve thought he was beautiful. Then again, his beauty was cold and hard, like the beauty a stone statue would have. She shifted her gaze from Nico to Percy and almost immediately regretted it.

            Annabeth wanted to avert her eyes, but the fallen messenger angel was watching her intently, his green irises brimming with tender affection. His eyes were the only things that suggested that he was not dead, for he looked sickly, his skin leeched of color and his cheekbones jutting from his face. He raised his head weakly and smiled thinly, a genuine smile, though it looked like it hurt to do so. He tried to sit up, his eyes full of joy, but Nico gently guided his head back down on the pillow, disregarding the pitifully quiet squeak of protest. The heroin was doing this to him. It was destroying him from the inside-out.

            The last figure wasn’t anyone Annabeth recognized. Her eyes shifted colors every time the blonde-haired girl blinked, and it was rather mesmerized by it. Blue. Green. Hazel. Gold. Brown. She was wearing doctor’s scrubs, yet she looked about Annabeth’s age, maybe even younger, and Annabeth would’ve only been enrolling in her first year of college by now. This girl was nowhere near being a graduate, yet she had the name tag and everything. Her skin was the color of caramel and her hair was held back in a choppy braid, with strands poking out this way and that, but another glance into her eyes and Annabeth saw a millennia of knowledge sealed within them, like the eyes of an old woman in the face of a young one. _Fallen angel?_ Annabeth wondered, but she knew it would be rude to ask.

            Pretty soon all of them were gathered in the dim light of the candle’s flame, which flitted this way and that like the wings of a bird. Everyone’s face was a grim mask, and nobody seemed to want to make the first move, but Annabeth managed to muster up enough courage to speak, “We’re ready. Anything this Lilith women throws at us, we’re ready for it.” Her voice didn’t sound as confident as she’d thought, and the words seemed hollow and empty, meaningless.

            “Lilith is powerful, much more powerful than any of us. If we want something that she has, we’re going to have to go through Hell and back, sometimes quite literally,” Nico replied stonily, running his free hand through his hair. His other hand, which had been clasped in Percy’s was now being held by Will. It was an odd match, Will and Nico; the dark fallen death angel with the sunny blond angel hunter, but something about it just felt…right. The tender affection in their eyes as they looked at each other couldn’t be topped by even the love that old couples shared. But the sad part was that Will would age. Nico would not. She could just imagine a young black-haired man with tears in his eyes as he held the hand of a much older man that could’ve been his grandfather. The man pressed his lips against the elder’s and watched with utter sorrow in pain in his eyes as the line on the heart monitor went flat.

            She quickly shook the depressing thought out of her head and concentrated on what Jason was saying, “…the Whisper. Annabeth are you listening?” She opened her mouth to object, but then she decided that she was just too tired to lie. She shook her head. Jason pursed his lips and rolled his eyes, but backtracked to the beginning of his exclamation, “We can’t have Percy coming with us, he’s too weak,” Annabeth immediately turned to Percy to see what he would say to that, but the fallen messenger angel was fast asleep amid a tumble of sheets, covers, and comforters, “so Piper here is going to stay and take care of him.” The girl from earlier gave a small wave and Annabeth returned it with a nod of acknowledgement. She seemed nice enough. Trustworthy enough to be tasked with caring for Percy. “The seven of us will go to Lilith, and Nico knows her location; the warehouse just next to the Whisper.”

            “But what if she’s expecting us?” Will asked, his eyes round and frightened. Nico gave his hand a reassuring squeeze that, at least from her angle, she couldn’t see if it was returned.

            “She won’t lay a finger on you,” the black-haired fallen angel growled, but immediately corrected himself, “Or anyone else.” Will gave him a dreamy look that clearly stated: _Good Lord I have a sexy, badass fallen death angel as a boyfriend. He’s soooo cool._

            “How do we know that she even has the wings?” Leo scoffed and crossed is arms, his tone skeptical.

            “She bought them off of me for six million dollars. She wouldn’t just do it to throw them away,” Jason replied, his blue eyes shining with agitation at the mention of the buyer of Percy’s wings. There was a darkness there, too, a darkness that Annabeth soon identified as guilt. “But I don’t think she’d want them just for decoration, though.”

            “Listen, I saw online that a canvas painted blue with a white line was sold for 4.3 million dollars. Anything is possible,” Reyna snorted. “She may just be a sick, sick body part collector.”

            “And _you’re_ sick, sick body part providers,” Nico snapped. “Shut up he’s talking.” Reyna, shocked that she was receiving that much sass from a fallen angel, had nothing more to say. Jason gave Nico a dirty look and the black-haired immortal only shrugged innocently.

            He continued, “Percy’s wings were the most powerful wings we’d ever sold, and the only black ones that that. They were the largest and the strongest, so that’s probably the reason why she’s never bought any of our other wings before. She’d planning something, but I’m not sure what.”

            “She could sew them onto her back to get to Heaven,” Annabeth suggested, but Nico shook his head almost immediately, his greasy bangs flopping with the movement. Annabeth guessed he was cute, in an emo-y sort of way, but he really wasn’t her type.

             “All fallen angels have wing stumps. They can never be removed. Trust me, on a sleepless night I attempted to have one of my fallen angel comrades cut it off with a chainsaw. It didn’t go very well,” he shivered. “It’s also why, when you guys try to cut cleanly,” he gave Jason a withering look, and the blond looked like he wanted to melt into his seat, “You can never manage to get all of it off. But anyhow, wing stumps are like puzzle pieces; only certain pieces will connect with one another, but that only applies to the artificially fallen. The true fallen, like Piper here, have had their wings ripped out by Uriel when they’re cast out of Heaven,” Piper visibly shuddered, “The Archangels burn the wings so they can never rise to Heaven again.  Lilith, however, is a demon. Her biology is literally incompatible with an angel’s, and sure, maybe it’s possible to sew angel wings onto a human and have it work, but with demons it’s a no go.

             “So with that being the case, only the artificially fallen, the ones who have had their wings severed by something or someone other than an Archangel, have a chance to rise into Heaven again. So unless Lilith burned Percy’s wings, which Jason said is probably not the case, we can get them and sew them back on. It’s going to require some heavy elbow grease, but I think we can do it,” Nico finished. Everyone, even Dakota and Leo, was nodding in agreement at the statement. Annabeth, however, was too infatuated with Percy to respond much.

            The fallen messenger angel had woken up sometime in between and was now staring at her, his eyes bright but tired. She offered him a smile and he flushed as red as a tomato, looking away sheepishly. Had the blond not been equally embarrassed, she would’ve chucked, so she settled for doing it on the inside; girls were usually depicted as the nervous and antsy ones, while the guys were confident and super gung-ho. This was an absolute polar opposite. She couldn’t concentrate much on that now, because Jason had just started handing out shot glasses, which had come from nowhere, and Annabeth agreed that she needed a drink, though none of them (except the fallen angels) were of legal drinking age.

            She took a sip from the golden liquid, expecting the burn of beer or whiskey, but was rather surprised. She wasn’t hesitant to voice her thoughts, “This is apple juice.” Jason shrugged.

            “We were all out of Sam Adams,” he replied.

            “But this is good apple juice,” Will added. He raised his glass, “Here’s to…whatever the hell people toast to!” We clinked glasses, but the uneasiness about the events that were to occur tomorrow night still hung thick in the air.


	15. An Edge of Grief

            Percy woke to a sharp and painful jolt that rocketed down his spine, like lightning. He sat bolt upright, gasping, and it took a few moments for him to blink the spots out of his eyes. It took a few more moments before he registered where he was, and to say that he was happy to be there would be a huge lie. He turned to find Piper poised in the chair by the corner, a newspaper crumpling in her clenched fist, and the look of alarm on her face clearly stated that Percy wasn’t the only one who’d felt the surge.

            “What was that?” he croaked, pain spiking through his skull as he forced out every word. Despite the fact that his muscles were weeping, he hauled himself into a sitting position, which took a little pressure off of his failing lungs. “Did you feel it, too?”

            “Of course,” Piper replied gravely, her face like a mask, her kaleidoscopic gaze boring into him. “Someone has just passed between worlds.” At that moment, Percy could see her as a healing angel on the battlefield as the Wars in Heaven raged, healing the wounded and dying. Her expression now was like she’d just lost one of her patients to the open arms of death; angels could be killed by certain weapons, such as Imperial Gold and Celestial Bronze (which were both mined and manufactured in Heaven and therefore weren’t available on Earth), but also much darker things like Stygian Iron, named after the powerful demoness, Styx.

            “That means…” Percy’s words died in his throat as he lowered his head, his teeth clamping down on his lip to keep the tears at bay. Piper, mercifully, finished his sentence for him.

            “Our friends are in great danger,” her voice was solemn, and Percy’s thoughts immediately flew to Jason, Nico, and Annabeth. One an unlikely friend, the other practically kin, and the last…a love that could never grow. They all meant so much to him, and the power that’d just been emitted meant that whoever was passing through worlds was using a portal, and Percy highly doubted that they were being taken to Heaven, considering the foe they’d set out to face was the mother of all demons. He thought of what his friends, and not just the three he'd mentioned, were going to be subject to; torture beyond their wildest dreams, back-breaking labor, and horrors that were so terrible that their souls would wither if they were exposed to it.

            “We have to go help them!” the fallen messenger angel cried weakly, though his voice was faint, and he began to pull tubes from his arms with quick, seamless precision. He didn’t expect Piper to leap from her seat and in two long strides eat up the distance between her and the bed, and no sooner had she reached Percy did she intervene, stopping him from taking out any more things that were attached to him. Her eyes blazed with gut-wrenching worry, not only for him but for the Golden Swords as well.

            “It was very foolish of you to start taking everything out like that; one of those tubes could’ve been keeping you alive, or at best it would knock you unconscious. Now I can understand why Annabeth calls you Seaweed Brain.” That pulled a smile from Percy as she began reattaching the IV needles and other pads that monitored his vitals. “But you’re weak. Too weak to go out and help by yourself, and I can’t have the other nurses watching you and potentially discovering that A) you have wing stumps, and B) you’re on heroin, so there will be no adventuring for you.”

            “I’m going to die anyway,” he snapped, trying to sound like a selfless hero but in reality his voice was bitter, filled with a weary acceptance. “My life doesn’t matter anymore. If we can’t get my wings back, I’m dead. If I go to get the wings and save my friends myself, I’m dead. It’s really a Catch-22. If one of us is going to die, it might as well be me.” Piper looked up to see Percy’s jaw squared, his eyes hard and emotionless, and at once she knew that this wasn't the Percy she knew talking. The old Percy, the one who she’d read about in newspapers like _The_ _Daily Disciple_ in Heaven, would spit on his fate and create his own, would strive to new heights and conquer unimaginable things. This Percy was worn and broken, but he could be fixed. Piper was positive. But she had to put her foot down on this one.

            “No, you’re not going to die, and that’s why you’re staying here. Your friends will find another way to do it, without your wings…”

            “And what if they don’t?” Percy argued, cutting her off. “If they fail and are slaughtered by Lilith, I’ll lie on this bed dying and know that I did nothing but be a burden to all of them. That I was the reason that they all died.” Piper was taken aback as he beat himself up over the entire situation. “It’s my fault I tried the heroin again. Luke was just an influence...” The fallen healing angel had had enough.

            “He forced it upon you!” she shouted, throwing her hands in the air in exasperation and trying to ignore the way Percy flinched away from her. “He forcibly injected you with the stuff and then left you to rot!” Her words reassured Percy a little, but not much; the whole situation was utterly hopeless, and now that he was pretty sure that all of this friends were in Hell, he knew that accomplishing what they’d set out to do was damn near impossible. Heck, Percy bet that there was only a .00000001% that was keeping it from being _completely_ impossible.

            “I guess you’re right,” he sighed, but he didn’t sound very convinced. Percy was loyal to a fault, and if it meant blaming himself in order to take the blame off of someone who he’d thought was a friend, he’d do it. It was the worst form of victim blaming, and he was doing it to himself. His voice was soft, “But I want to walk. I want to look out the window and see the sky.” Piper gave him a sad look and migrated over to the windows, throwing open the curtains and letting a stream of golden light illuminate the room.   

            “You can look from your bed,” Piper told him gently, but guilt clawed at her heart as he folded his withering, delicate hands and dipped his head in both affirmative and defeat. She tried to lighten the mood a little by saying, “I’m going to get you something to eat, and you better not leave that bed, Mister, or you’ll have another thing coming.” But despite this, Percy didn’t look up, not even saying goodbye as she made a move to leave, and she lingered at the door, just watching his slumped form with an anxious expression before slipping out.

 After Piper left, the fallen angel remained sitting up with his hands folded, before deciding that something was better than nothing. He strained to look out of the window, which was large and spanned almost the entirety of the right wall, but he didn’t really have a good vantage point from where he sat. All he could see was an endless blue sky and the occasional wispy cloud or plane. Percy actually wanted to see. He wanted to see people, wanted to see the trees and the roads and the buildings, not just a reminder of where his family was and of all he’d lost. Hell, perhaps he’d just lost more.

            Percy sighed sadly, but was determined to see out of that stupid window if it was the last thing he did, and he felt some of his old stubbornness returning, back from when he wasn’t always too exhausted to complain. Even so, in Heaven Piper was known to have a very short and fussy temper, and he didn’t want to risk confronting one of the fallen angels who was notorious for having the most ferocious rage of all. His stomach whimpered a bit and the addiction, slowed due to the fact that he was starving, slammed against his skull like a shark slamming into the tank wall. He decided that, even if he wanted to see out the window, his body wouldn’t let him.

            Piper had resorted to giving him one injection of heroin a day, and that needle full of melted powder was killing him and keeping him alive, only barely. He knew that this kind of withdrawal was only speeding up the process of the Eternal Healing Slumber taking over, but he didn’t want to voice it out loud. He didn’t even know if angels could die at the hands of an addiction; it was just a theory. Usually, angels fell to Stygian Iron swords in the heat of combat, and never beyond the battlefield. In fact, it seemed rather irrational to be jumping to conclusions. All of his friends thought it was better to be safe than sorry, and Percy had to agree. He was terrified of death, which was such a morbid topic that was rather alien in Heaven. Nobody even thought of death, for the rules of Archangel Azrael didn’t apply to them in times of peace, and there hadn’t been a war since before Earth was a twinkle in God’s eye. Angels usually associated death with those who were mortal, the lesser beings that were so helpless that angels, as divine beings, were obliged protect them 24/7.

            But when he thought about it, death had no positive outcomes. It was both horrifying and depressing, both for the person who was dying and those touched by them. Those who weren’t dead sometimes killed themselves because they’d lost someone, and that just set off a chain reaction of mindless life wasting that only humans could ever fathom to uphold. Sure, death was what kept the population down (though humans were still managing to evade it as they developed their puny little medicines), and death was also what ended wars, or what caused them. It kept the scale balanced, though, and without death there was no life, and humans were keen to note that they had a small lifespan. They never forgot it, working away in their little world; some just living to live and others striving to leave their mark on the world.

            Percy thought that even if he did survive and return to Heaven, he could never forget this. This had left its mark on Percy just like how a select amount of humans left their marks on the world. It would never go away, not as long as he survived this whole thing. He could live for millennia afterwards and still never get the blonde hair and grey eyes of Annabeth out of his mind, along with the hopeful faces of his friends and the hard expressions of his enemies. He, Nico, and Piper would live forever amongst the masses, concealed and scraping away, while the others grew old and died. The world moved on without them, and Percy would be the one to watch as Archangel Azrael deposited them in purgatory, and hopefully the good they had done would weigh out the bad, and all of them would live until the end of time in Sagun, the third Heaven.

             When, if, Percy’s friends were able to earn his wings back, then he would no longer be a fallen angel. The rules would once again apply to him, and he’d be forbidden from talking to Nico and Piper, and if he did so and was caught, he’d become fallen once more, and this time stay fallen. Maybe he would be able to visit his friends once they passed into the next life, but it wouldn’t ease the pain and the realizations; his friends would grow old and wither away at some point, and he would be forbidden from intervening. The mere fact that time didn’t care that people were dying sent shivers up and down Percy’s spine, and he wondered if kicking the bucket wasn’t so bad after all; it certainly outweighed living only to watch everyone around him drop like flies.

            But it wasn’t looking too well so far. If his friends were in Hell, then there was no way to get them out again until Lilith teleported them or he went to get them himself, which was suicide in its purest form. He’d need an Archangel to get Piper and him into Hell, and even then Percy had no idea which Circle out of nine they were in, and with Lilith being the very intelligent wife of Lucifer, she would be a loose cannon and could possibly kill his friends as well as him because he tried for a rescue attempt. Hand in hand with that came the fact that there was no Archangel that would even give him, a fallen angel who was addicted to heroin, a second glance unless they really wanted him back. Percy paused in his reveries, and an idea began to bud inside his head. He was pretty sure that he had hatched the greatest master plan ever, when Reyna burst into the room, with Piper on her heels.

            “What happened?” Percy cried as he saw the panicked look on her face.

            “She took them. She took _everyone._ I was very nervous about facing her, so I stayed behind in the alley and wait it out, but I’m pretty sure saw me Leo. Everyone seemed to be too distracted with Lilith and that traitor Luke to notice that I was gone, but-” The fallen messenger angel cut the terrified young woman off.

            “What do you mean?!”

            “It was awful, just horrible, he was terrifying and menacing with that number burned into his chest as if it were an award…”

            “Just tell me what’s going on!” Percy insisted, trying to calm her down best he could from the position he was in. It would’ve been funny had it not been so morbid; a dead man walking trying to assure a panicked soldier that they weren’t going to die.

            “She sewed your wings onto Luke’s back.” Silence. “He’s wearing your wings like they’re his, and now Lilith and the others are in Hell, and there’s no way to get them back.” More silence. Piper only stared, the food tray that she’d arranged for Percy clattering out of her trembling hands and spilling all over the floor. Percy was kind of glad, since it consisted of salad and his heroin dose, though his body roared in fury as the syringe shattered and the heroin pooled on the floor. The fallen messenger angel tried to ignore it and opened his mouth to say something, then closed it, speechless. Luke had been his tormentor, and he hated him with all of his heart, but he never knew that he could hate someone as much as he did now.

            He finally spoke up, “I have a plan.” It came out as a snarl. “And it will involve me taking back my wings and ripping Luke apart, piece by piece.”

 

\----Ω----

 

            “Anything else, sir?” the messenger angel asked. Her wings were the color of eagle’s feathers, and they were rather small, but they were still sturdy and able to get the job done. Archangel Michael seemed rather distracted, however, and she waited patiently for him to snap out of his musings on his own.

            Finally he said, “No, nothing more is needed today, Hazel.” The messenger angel, Hazel, bowed waist low and took off out the still-open doors. Her wings ached from the day of flying back and forth all across the seven Heavens, but she loved the feeling. It meant she was pushing herself, working hard for Archangel Michael. When she had been chosen, all but two or three months ago, she had felt both honored and blessed. She thanked the Creator every day leading up to the first message she delivered for the wisest, youngest, strongest Archangel there was. She had been oblivious to the whispers behind her back, the pained looks that strangers had on their faces when they looked at her, and most of all the sneers of those who thought she was unworthy.

            She knew that she would never be a better substitute than Perseus, who was on a first name basis with the entirety of the staff at Archangel Michael’s palace. They turned to give a message to her and their face fell when they saw that she wasn’t Percy, and she constantly saw them walking into The Room to ask about something and then finding it empty.

            The Room.

            It was one of the only places that Archangel Michael had forbade her from going to, and she’d upheld her word for the most part. It was Perseus’ old quarters, stationed right next to the Archangel’s room and in the perfect place for Michael to just walk over and ask to have a message delivered. He’d refused to put Hazel in it, which she tried not to be offended by, and Chiron had received the most withering glare when he’d suggested cleaning it out. In fact, Hazel would’ve mistaken the sorrow in his eyes for fury towards his advisor had she not walked by the Room later and found Michael’s face buried in the sheets as he sobbed. She hadn’t seen the Archangel cry anywhere else but in that room, and it was immediately after she saw him break down did she realize that she may be worthy to be a messenger for Michael, but she’d never be Percy.

            “I think Michael hates me,” she said absently one morning as Zoë tidied up her room. The angel of nature stopped dusting abruptly, turning to Hazel with soft eyes and a pitying expression, one that Hazel loved and loathed at the same time.

            “He doesn’t hate you, Hazel,” she whispered softly, her words like a prayer. “It’s just that…” she paused, ducking her head, and the messenger was unable to read her face. When she turned to Hazel again her eyes were glistening with unshed tears. “We just miss out Percy, that’s all. He was much messier than you and harder to clean up after, that’s for sure,” a dry laugh, “but he was dear to us beyond anything you could ever imagine.” Zoë’s expression clearly stated that she was going to speak some more, and Hazel didn’t dare stop her; she hadn’t ever received this much information about Percy. To her, Perseus was an angel elevated on a pedestal, someone that everyone in this palace loved more than they’d ever love her, someone that Michael took so much pride in. It was like trying to fill the shoes of a god; it was impossible to say the least.

            Zoë drew in a ragged breath and continued, the feathers of her duster dancing over the windows, “Some would call him lazy. Others rude. And a few even dubbed him as the Antichrist. He’d suffered so much prejudice all of his life. He was expelled from every school he'd attended because he ‘disturbed the peace and made other fledglings uncomfortable’, and never made any friends except for that Grover kid who soon went off the deep end to pursue nature conservation; he didn’t like his Calling as an angel of beauty and the arts.”

            “Sounds like my brother,” Hazel sighed, having long since stopped breaking down every time she even thought of her brother or heard his name. “He wasn't very popular in school, either.” Zoë smiled at her and returned to her cleaning, her wings fluttering as she worked.

            “This is just a theory, but I think Michael was going to court him.”

            “What?!” Hazel was flabbergasted, and all of a sudden everything made sense. The way he had a slip of paper, a note apparently written by Percy, in his armor and read it at least five times a day. The way he tried to show no emotion towards Hazel whatsoever. The way he visited the Room and cried himself to sleep curled amidst black feathers.

            “You didn’t hear it from me,” Zoë snapped. “But I just know that he doesn’t hate you. He’s lovesick.” Thank God. The relief that Hazel was feeling was unlike any other feeling she’d experienced before; raw and all-encompassing. It wasn't that Michael didn’t like her. It wasn’t that she was a bad messenger angel. It was just that her predecessor was the Archangel’s potential mate. She deserved to be Michael’s messenger, and now that she understood everything, it would be easier for her to do her job. She couldn’t help but remember the day when her life flipped upside-down.

 

\----Ω----

 

            _Hazel had still been deeply aggrieved by the loss of her brother Nicolas, and her boyfriend, an angel of nature named Frank, had desperately been trying to console her. Frank was a gentle giant, very muscular and tall but still kind, caring, and considerate. Hazel knew that he had always been intimidated by her half-brother, but he still made an effort to get her back on her feet again. His profession usually revolved around nature as a whole, but he was more interested in animals. He would bring home parakeets, lizards, cats, dogs, horses, tigers, and even would babysit some of the Cherubim’s phoenixes when they needed to have work done. It became such an obsession that he learned to polymorph into any animal he wished, though he was only permitted by the Archangels to turn into animals of the mortal world and not the celestial one._

_His wings were rarely used due to the fact that he enjoyed to turn into an eagle to fly or a cheetah to run. They were rust-colored, with streaks of black and brown here and there, but nonetheless beautiful. Even so, most viewed him as a klutz and an oddball, due to his hobby of studying mortal animals. They didn’t think that the mortal world was good for anything but protecting and anyone associated with it besides guardian angels, since it was their job, was immediately ridiculed._

_On the fateful day when she received the letter asking her to become Archangel Michael’s messenger, Hazel was sitting on her couch staring at a framed photo of her and Nico solemnly. Frank was curled on her lap as a grey tabby cat with small rusty wings, purring and nuzzling her, trying to ease her out of her depression. He batted at the photo irritably with his paw and she finally mustered enough resolve to set it back down on the end table and concentrate on the love of her life. Frank rolled onto his stomach and Hazel rubbed his belly, and then she realized that Frank was still, indeed, an angel and she shoved him off of her lap, squealing, “Perv!”_

_Frank returned to his humanoid form, grinning like a maniac. He ruffled her hair and she swatted his hands away. That’s when the doorbell rang. Hazel managed to wrestle Frank off of her and flew towards the door, landing gently on the floorboards and opening it. It revealed the one and only Archangel Gabriel, the ruler of all the messenger angels. She fell to one knee almost immediately, as did Frank, who had been following her._

_“It is an honor!” she told the black-haired Archangel gratefully._

_“Rise,” he told them, his voice resonant and full of authority. He handed a scroll to Hazel, which was bound with a red ribbon. “A message from Archangel Michael.” And with that he was gone, faster than Hazel could blink._

_“Archangel Michael?” Frank choked. “You either did something awesome or really, really stupid.” Hazel sniffed it._

_“Well there’s no chloroform or ether on it so that’s a good start.” she stated and, with trembling fingers, undid the pretty red bow and handed it to Frank. The scroll was fairly new, so it wasn’t another pre-written I’m-sorry-for-your-loss scroll. Some death angels were assigned to, for every angel created, hand-write an ‘I’m-sorry-for-your-loss’ scroll for that angel’s acquaintances in case something, such as them becoming fallen or their death, happened. They kept these scrolls by the thousands in huge archives, most of them so old that one touch and they would crumble to dust._

_Only a few were used each year, and most remained untouched for thousands upon thousands of years. Even the Archangels had received one when Lucifer fell from Heaven, and, legend has it, even the Creator did so as well. Hazel had received Nico’s, which was so old that the parchment had crackled at her touch, only a few days ago, and she had framed it and hung it in her room, against Frank’s wishes for her to burn it in the hearth. Somewhere in those archives, there was a scroll with her name on it, which was pretty scary to think about._

_Hazel slowly unrolled the scroll, and the first thing she noticed was the angelic seal depicting the cross, the Star of David, and several other religious emblems and symbols stamped onto the top of the parchment, true and genuine. Under it read:_

Dear Hazel,

 

After the loss of my former messenger, Perseus, your employer, Connor, has recommended you as a replacement. He claims you are faster than lightning and incredibly diligent and thoughtful, though he seemed deeply aggrieved due to the loss of his brother a fortnight ago. It would be a pleasure to meet you and see you demonstrate your skills, if you may. I shall expect you at my palace in three days’ time at the light of dawn unless you send another messenger angel back with a scroll saying that you are not interested. I must warn you that being my messenger requires top physical condition, for you will be worked to the breaking point. It also must require proper values, such as respect and humbleness, in order for problems to sort themselves out. I sincerely hope that you will attempt to claim this job, for I have also sent this letter out to several others that you will meet. Please dress informally for this meeting, and you shall not be permitted to wear any clothing that shall increase your speed or agility when flying.

Best Regards,

Archangel Michael

_The next three days had been grueling. She knew that she shouldn’t decline the invitation, for this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but the loss of Nicolas still weighed her down with every step. Frank was trying extra hard to cheer her up, and she was glad for the distraction. When the time came, it had been extra hard to choose a plain white T-shirt and shorts rather than her very expensive and formal dress she had received as a gift for her last birthday._

_As she showed the guards the letter, they allowed her to pass, and that’s when she realized just how many people the Archangel had nominated. It was going to be a very tough competition, one that she would most likely lose. Why did Connor have to nominate her? There were many angels milling around the entrance hall, whispering excitedly to each other, but there was a thick veil of anxiousness over everyone,_ Would they be picked? What if they were really bad? _Hazel had managed to talk to everyone that had been nominated, and she realized that they were all very good people, unlike the classic gritty, ruthless opponents in books._

_Two of them had been twins, Castor and Pollux, who both looked exactly alike and both had navy wings streaked with silver, which were very pleasing to the eye. Both had been very charming, but too flirtatious for Hazel’s liking. She had repeatedly told them that she had a boyfriend, but that information went through one ear and out the other. Not to mention that she couldn’t tell one brother from the other, since they were both wearing the exact same purple T-shirt and shorts._

_Others included angels such as Malcolm, Jake Mason, Charles Beckendorf, Christopher Rodriguez, and Lee Fletcher. That’s when Hazel realized that she was the only female within this entire competition. Males usually had larger, sturdier wings which made Hazel’s wings look like propellers compared to their jet engines. Then again Hazel had a smaller and lighter build that would benefit her immensely, along with a lanky form that would be able to be easily streamlined. She paced nervously, and her hands were shaking. She wished Frank was here to cheer her on, but he had been forbidden from coming along. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach and made it twist into knots. She didn’t know if she could do this at all, she was just too nervous._

_“Hazel, you are to be the first one tested,” came a voice. Everyone turned to see Archangel Michael standing there in his full glory. They all fell to one knee, and he ordered them to rise. He was so beautiful, but there were dark shadows under his eyes, and his face had taken on a melancholy expression. The whole of Heaven knew how sorrowful he had been over the loss of Perseus, who had been his messenger since the beginning of time, and it had certainly had a huge effect on him._

_Hazel approached shakily, trying to hide her trembling hands behind her back. Archangel Michael studied her with a penetrating blue gaze, and motioned for her to follow him. They passed many, many rooms filled with lavish furniture and paintings depicting scenes of religious importance. Other workers of the Archangel’s bustled around to get things done, but everything was disorganized due to the lack of a messenger angel. Luckily, Hazel was only going to be Michael’s personal messenger and not the universal one that all of the workers called to, for that would require a lot of work._

_The Archangel walked with purpose, and he was a whole foot taller than her. His wings were so large that the bottom feathers were rumpled from grazing across the ground, and they shimmered gold in the light of thousands of candles. She followed him for what seemed like hours, and finally the halls opened up into a grand garden. Flowers of all shapes, sizes, and colors reached up to the sky. From a tiny white daisy to a towering sunflower as bright as the star it was named from. Tulips sprang from the ground, their yellow petals streaked with reds, oranges, and even blues and purples. A gargantuan bush towered over the two angels, from which bloomed an array of flowers in all the colors of the rainbow. The grass was so much greener, and the paved cobblestones glimmered in the early morning light. Hazel couldn’t help but notice that everywhere Archangel Michael stepped a pretty blue flower bloomed, but it was quickly removed by the gardeners and re-planted somewhere else. Waterfalls trickled amongst the rocks and dirt, their steady bubbling soothing Hazel’s nervous and scattered thoughts._

_The path wound around, and Hazel could barely take it all in. Tiny dragons as long as Hazel’s forefinger buzzed around from flower to flower and birds sang beautiful hymns in the trees, darting around on agile little wings. The sky was lightening and to the east Hazel could see the reds, oranges, and yellows streaking across the sky. The shrubbery began to thin out until they reached a small, circular patio with stone benches and statues of little cherubs here and there. Archangel Michael stopped and Hazel nearly ran into him, which would have been mortifying, but she stopped herself just in time. The gorgeous young man gave her a quick once-over and said, “You have five minutes to demonstrate your skill. Your time…starts…now!”_


	16. Screaming in the Silence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note that there is Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con in this chapter pertaining to Jason, and implied Stockholm Syndrome. It may be disturbing to some.

Wills knuckles were raw, and it didn’t help that his new “friend”, Minos, was breathing down his neck.

            “I want to see my exquisite, and rather breathtaking if I do say so myself, in these floors,” the demon grunted, his voice as if several people were talking at once. At this, Will rolled his eyes, but he didn’t dare do that to his guard’s face lest he face the undoubtedly painful consequences. Minos was scary in the sense that he was unsuspecting; one wouldn’t realize that he was a little less than human until it was too late. He was very tall and imposing, his eyes like shards of ice that would bore into Will’s back and cut it to pieces while the human worked. His beard was pointed like a spear blade, and he always wore these white robes that made him look like a disgraced angel, though the spiraling horns that curled from his forehead and his lack of wings scars begged to differ. When angry, Minos’ fingernails, which were already slightly pointy in the first place, would turn into claws, and his (two rows of) teeth would turn into sharp, serrated fangs that could crush bone. Needless to say, Will didn’t get on his bad side if he could help it.

            The blood from the human’s knuckles was mixing with the soap and staining the yellow sponge, causing the wounds to sting. He was on his hands and knees, and he was wearing nothing but a shirt collar, a bowtie, and some very tight jeans. Lilith’s version of a joke, he supposed, not to mention that she slapped his ass every time he walked by. Will hated being a servant, and along with Gwen, Annabeth, Dakota, Leo, and Nico, he did all Lilith’s dirty work. He was forced to be half-naked all the time, along with all of the other guys, and luckily this rule didn’t apply to the ladies, but their required outfits were no less mortifying and actually a little more uncomfortable. It was what Lilith liked to call “putting a little flair into the classical maid uniform.”

            The girls had to wear a very low-cut black corset-style top with white lace trim, and under that an actual corset. On top of that they were fitted with a short, puffy black skirt and fishnet stockings, complete with heels, a black lace choker with a dog license attached (which their names were on), and a white lace headband. They had to walk around like that, actually walk! With all of the dusting they did, and there was a lot of dust, mind you, with the feather dusters they’d been handed, it must’ve been Hell. Then again, they were all in Hell.

             The worst part was that they were forbidden from talking. Period. One peep and they’d be hung by their wrists from the ceiling, and Will was lucky enough to have a firsthand experience for saying “Ow” when he cut himself on a protruding nail. Will could no longer talk with his love, and they couldn’t even make eye contact or risk undergoing the same punishment as the one they suffered through when they talked.

            Annabeth had it easy, she was a parlor maid, chosen to be that because of her looks. All she had to do was wait on guests when present and tidy up the room where they talked, which was, of course, the parlor. The only problem was that she wasn’t technically Lilith’s, she was Luke’s. The traitor had specifically requested her, and, being Lilith’s champion, he got what he wanted. Leo and Dakota also technically belonged to him, as well, but they were kind of universal and didn’t have a specific job; they just took whatever was dished out to them. 

            Sure, the palace of Lucifer was gigantic and one could spend their entire lives exploring its rooms and gardens, but once one of the servants passed through the iron gates, they were welcomed by an electric shock. Lilith had placed devices inside their neckwear, whether they be bowties or chokers, so that anyone who left the grounds ran into an invisible fence, like the ones owners use to keep their dogs inside. Why not just take their neckwear off and run? The problem was they were monitored 24/7 by demon guards, hence the reason why Minos was always breathing down Will’s neck. They were armed with whips, Tasers, and guns if necessary. Great.

            Will inhaled sharply as his wounds began to sting even more as the blood mixed sickeningly with the soap, staining the floor a dull red wherever the suds touched it.

            “Forget what I said about my reflection. This new technique you have is magnificent!” Minos chuckled coldly, and the presence of him behind Will made the hairs on the back of his neck stand straight up. The demon took a deep breath and shuddered a bit as the sharp tang of blood, no doubt delectable in his eyes, filled his nostrils. He licked his lips and, out of nervousness, Will began to scrub harder. He was so concentrated on his task that he didn’t hear the sound of clicking heels until a shadow fell over him.

            “It can’t be perfect, sweetie,” said a drawling, sexy voice. “I love the blood aspect, and for that you get extra dinner tonight.” He looked up to see Lilith, her lips quirked into a sadistic yet seductive smirk. At her mention of dinner, Will’s stomach let out a groan, which she grinned wickedly at. She and Minos engaged in mindless conversation as Will scrubbed, still not having been given the order to stop doing so, and he felt like he would collapse from exhaustion. That’s when Asmodeus strut in, and immediately the air in the room became ten degrees colder.

            Asmodeus was a prince of Hell, one of Lucifer and Lilith’s seven sons that all represented the seven deadly sins. Will cursed himself inwardly as Little Will suddenly became very interested and jut against his tight slacks, much to all the demons’ amusement. Needless to say, Asmodeus ruled over lust. It was awful because he was gorgeous, taking the good looks gene from his father and his mother; he had high cheekbones and what was undoubtedly Lucifer’s blond hair, but his eyes were the color of obsidian like his mother’s, only that the blackness completely consumed his eyes, as if the pupil had swallowed them up. He was by far Lilith’s favorite if you didn’t count the prince of pride, who was Lucifer. Leviathan (envy), Beelzebub (gluttony), Belphegor (sloth), and Azazel (wrath), were all secondary and rarely came to the palace, though Mammon, who represented greed, just so happened to have changed his name to Minos.

            The princes of Hell, excluding Lucifer, just so happened to be going through a Greek phase. Leviathan now liked to call herself Medusa, since her true form, a snake, was perfectly represented by what the Greek monster’s hair was made of. Azazel liked to be called Kronos, the god of time who’d eaten his children, since he himself was obsessed with kidnapping and killing human babies. Beelzebub was now Phineas, the seer who could never eat because of a horde of angry harpies, and had chosen the name because he actually liked to eat a lot and was supposed to represent if he overcame the woman-bird hybrids. Belphegor had yet to show his face, and Will had no idea who he called himself, but he really didn’t want to find out, now did he? He was so absorbed in his thoughts that only then did he see Jason trailing behind Asmodeus like a shadow.

            He was the only one who didn’t belong to either Lilith or Luke, and he had the worst punishment of all. It was predictable, since Asmodeus was the prince of lust, but that didn’t make it any more terrifying and wrong. To put it shortly, Jason was a gift to Asmodeus for the demon’s birthday to calm his raging libido.

            Will could feel his heart wrenching when he saw his friend, who could be described as nothing other than a complete mess. His pupils were blown wide from the demon's influence, and even though he was doing nothing but standing there, Will could see how he was trembling. His arms were like sticks and his cheekbones jut out of his face. His eyes looked haunted.

            Everyone, including Jason, ignored Will as they talked, and Minos assured his mother that no, he didn’t mind babysitting her servant and that he actually enjoyed it. Was Will for sale? No, he wasn’t. Just back and forth and back and forth. Asmodeus had started out as an active participant in the conversation, but had soon withdrawn as he focused a lot more on Jason, who seemed to curl in on himself at the attention.

            “You know what?” he announced, his black eyes glittering in the sharply in the light. “We're going to my room.” Lilith rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, frowning.

            “You’re going to kill it, you know, if you keep up your shenanigans all day without proper rest. When’s the last time you fed it anything?”

            “It's fine, right?"

           His eyes flashed coldly, and Jason nodded quickly.

            “See?”

            “Don't think I don't know you're threatening it. You took on the responsibility and now you have to care for it properly,” Lilith sounded like she was talking to her son about how she’s unsatisfied with the care for his dog, and Will scrubbed harder to keep the tears from pricking his eyes. “Your libido has somehow gotten worse. This thing was supposed to sate you a little.”

            “You have gotten more…lustful, but it would be wise to feed it,” Minos agreed in the authoritative voice of an older brother. “Is a sack of skin and bones attractive to you?”

            “I guess you have a point,” Asmodeus admitted, frowning. He turned to Jason, “Maybe after we get to bed, hm?” Jason nodded tersely, and Asmodeus smiled as the blond practically dragged him from the room. Will hated Lilith and everyone and everything that associated with her, and now he had to watch as his friend was reduced to nothing but a hollow shell. Jason was probably the only one being tortured out of all the Golden Swords, and Will wished he could do something, anything. But he was helpless, for Annabeth had agreed that they would follow her terms, which meant being obedient as well as subservient. As a scream of ecstasy echoed down the hall, very faint but still there, Will prayed that Jason would be welcomed into insanity’s embrace before every last drop of his free will was constricted out of him slowly and painfully.

            Lilith ignored it, instead looking down at Will, who was still scrubbing, and stating smugly, “Be a good human and you won’t have to end up like Jason, who rebuffed my affections before and now has to pay for it. At least with me, he wouldn’t have to take it up the ass, and I’m a bit more…gentle, than my son. His breaking in would be almost artful, not brutal. But sadly, that path is closed to him now, because Asmodeus seems to like him a lot, though he’ll probably forget to feed him again. You are dismissed. Until next time, William.” And with that, she whisked off, ignoring the other scream that tapered off to a high-pitched whine off in the distance. Will was pretty sure he wasn’t going to keep his food down, but he forced his churning stomach to quiet; he needed that food, because he didn’t know when he’d get some more.

            Shakily, he rose to his feet and began to massage his sore hands and wrists. Minos waited patiently as the blond popped some of his joints and cracked his neck. It was horrible having to bend over to clean, and it would most likely result in Will becoming a hunchback or something. Realizing that was his last job that he had to perform for the day, the boy began to pad away towards the servant’s quarters. For once Minos didn’t follow, and Will felt blessed to not have that cruel demon observing his every move with eyes like a hawk. He found Nico waiting for him, and they exchanged the slightest of nods as the security camera zoomed in on the two of them. Will could see the longing in his boyfriend’s eyes as their gazes locked. He wished they could have telepathy or something, but that was a childish fantasy.

            _I love you._ The voice came very, very suddenly and Will looked around in utter confusion. It was obvious that Nico hadn’t spoken, but then again he was the only other person in the room that could have said that.

            The voice came again, _I love you._ Will’s gaze met his boyfriend’s, and he realized that Nico’s eyes were pleading for him to stay calm. That’s when the blond realized what was going on; Nico was a fallen angel, and apparently he could reach out into people’s minds and speak to them. If Will became frightened, it wouldn’t take Lilith long to put the pieces together, so he relaxed into the covers, and stared up at the ceiling. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Nico’s anxious expression melting away into relief.

            _You can’t talk back, but I’d like you to roll your shoulders if you can hear me._ Will rolled his shoulders and he heard a sigh in his head. _No matter what happens, I love you, Sunshine. I…I probably shouldn’t be invading your privacy, but-._ The blond nearly smiled to himself as the fallen angel stumbled over his words like the nervous wreck he was. That’s when the door to the servant’s chamber suddenly opened. There wasn’t a sound, which was quite the contrary to the loud squeal of rusted hinges that usually resounded throughout the chamber, and all of the hairs on Will’s arms and neck stood straight up as he was touched by the breath of air that came with the door swinging ajar. Nico and Will turned slowly, and they were met by the most gruesome sight they’d ever seen in their lives.

            “It can’t be,” Nico whispered, his voice but a breath as he went pale and sprung to his feet. In stepped the most terrifying creature that Will had encountered in all of his time as a part of the celestial world. It was an angel…but only barely. Its feathers were falling in clumps of dirty white, and the bones of its wings shone out under huge gashes and slices. The feathers just kept growing back, clinging for a few moments before fluttering to the ground. Over each eye a sickening slice ran perpendicular to its eyelids, and occasionally blood would drip from its tear glands, as if it were crying. Though its lips were not moving, heart-wrenching wails could be heard, so deafening that Will though his eardrums were going to burst. Its form was skeletal, and it was wearing a rather dirty toga that was tattered and stained with blood, both old and fresh.

            _A Watcher._ Nico’s voice was panicked inside his boyfriend’s head. _This is one of the original angels that fell from Heaven, one of the ones that were cast out by Lucifer. They all became Watchers. They are now shedding the tears of all their sins, paying the price in blood. Legend has it that once the angel has cried out all of the tainted blood it will turn to dust, which is a blessing when you are suffering for all eternity. It takes thousands upon thousands of years, though, but eventually all Watchers cry out the tainted blood and disintegrate. There are worse fates._

The Watcher came forward, outstretching its arms. Will and Nico backed up, and the blond couldn’t help but notice the holes in its hands and feet that smoldered and bled; the marks of Christ that eternally punished it. It continued to advance, and a decent distance was kept between the two lovers and the Watcher until their backs hit the wall. There was nothing they could do, nowhere they could go, and Will’s heart began to slam inside his ribcage as the thing shuffled forwards.

            “ _This is a kindness_ ,” it croaked, tilting its head and grinning, revealing wickedly sharp teeth. Will recoiled as it reached out to touch him, but there was only so much more space he could retreat. The servant’s quarters were small, and this thing was going to get what it wanted whether Will and Nico liked it or not. Being the gentle person he was, the blond couldn’t help but sympathize. It was in pain and had been suffering for a while now. It was just afraid and in agony, it couldn’t help it. Then again it was doing something very, very creepy that would probably result in both he and Nico’s death. Had Lilith sent it? If now, how did it get inside?

            _Will,_ Nico squeaked. He turned to his boyfriend to signal that he’d heard, but then the world suddenly was red. All he could process was Nico screaming his name as he felt the Watcher’s cold and callused hand touching the back of his neck. Then everything went black.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Asmodeus plopped down into his chair for dinner, right next to his mother, with Jason noticeably absent.

            “Where's your pet?" Lilith inquired as she filled her plate.

            "Resting."

            "The truth, please."

            "Fine, it passed out. Not my fault."

            "You didn't feed it," Minos pointed out angrily. "No wonder why the thing's deteriorating."

            "It's fine."

            "Whatever you say, but if it dies I'm not getting you another one," Lilith warned, a smile lighting up her face as Asmodeus grumbled and began to fill an extra plate to bring back to Jason.

              They talked about nonsensical things for a while before the topic of Asmodeus's human came up yet again. 

             "Dearie, I really think you should start just keeping it in your room. It's suffering, the poor thing,” Lilith explained. “Since you're not keeping it on a normal feeding schedule, it'll have trouble walking. Best not waste its energy."

            "Yeah, the thing will run itself into the ground," Minos agreed, and Asmodeus's face contorted as he stabbed his knife into the meat of his steak. 

            "I'm taking care of him just fine, thank you very much."

            "Well, I don't want to see this thing around my house, limping and looking on the brink of tears," Lilith retorted angrily, and Asmodeus looked about to argue when a scream ripped through the palace.

            "Will!

            “What on Earth…?”

            The scream came again, "Will!"

            The three demons were on their feet in an instant, dashing towards the servants' quarters, where the source of the sound had come from. 

           "What the hell is with all the commotio-" Lilith stopped dead at the threshold and stared, wide-eyed as her sons tried to squeeze in around her.

            Right there was a terrible creature, and it had its fangs sinking into Will’s neck. The boy’s eyes were half-closed and he moaned in agony, struggling feebly in its tight grip. Lilith had reached the room first, mouth open and halfway through a scolding that would’ve involved whips, and stopped. At the sound of their arrival, the creature looked up, and to Jason’s horror it was crying blood through eyelids that were cut into fourths.

            “Not you again,” Lilith hissed, the lecture forgotten. “I told you to get out.”

            “ _A fateful day looms ahead, Lilith. We will be there when it happens, when the hero strikes you, your sons, and your filthy little champion down, and we will rejoice as the light of Heaven touches us once more. We will sing.”_

“It is impossible for you filthy vermin to rise!” Lilith shrilled, and though her voice sounded confident, it was laced with fear. Asmodeus and Minos flanked her, snarling, and Jason shrank back. He tried to ignore the horrified and pitying glance that he saw Nico cast him out of his peripheral vision.

            “ _It is not that we will rise. It’s that you will fall._ ”


	17. The Flowers Wither

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am terrible when it comes to time in my stories, so excuse me if I get it wrong. I also incorporate a phone number in this chapter, which I RANDOMLY made up, so any relations to phone numbers of people living or dead is completely coincidental.

Percy had absolutely no fucking idea what to do. His friends were no doubt in Hell being used as servants, slaves, chew toys, you name it, and a few hours in the human world was a few _days_ in Hell. Time went a lot faster down there, and when one of the Cherubim had tried to explain it to him, the information went in through one ear and out through the other; it was just a bunch of science-y stuff, but the basic idea was that time went fast despite the fact that, to people who were actually in Hell, it was like any other day. The fact that they’d been suffering much longer than Percy thought all the more spurred him on towards finding a solution, which was currently evading him, Reyna, and Piper at the moment.

            The day was dreary and solemn, the sky devastatingly overcast, and it was as if mother nature had taken notice of the events that were unfolding. When Piper opened the windows earlier, the sharp tang of an oncoming storm had ridden in on the wind, which was picking up slowly as every second ticked by. They didn’t need to be swamped by a downpour on top of everything else, and Percy was adamant that they figured out what to do with their three-person army. He already had a vague idea of how this was all going to unfold, having hatched it right before Reyna burst into the room, but he had no idea how he was going to execute it.

 “We don’t have much time,” he told the two girls as he paced, and he felt useless as he stated the obvious and didn’t get down to the details that were going to spring their friends free. Reyna and Piper were sitting on the bed, watching Percy pace anxiously like a caged tiger that was drunk; he was staggering a bit, but after his last dose of heroin he was doing pretty well, considering the circumstances. The gusts that were bursting forth from the window made the curtains flutter and shift, casting dancing shadows on the walls; they hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights, which only served to bother and hurt Percy’s eyes, and they were only going by the bleak sunlight that managed to slip through the blanket of clouds overhead.

“It’s been roughly a day up here, so, judging from what you two have told me, it must’ve been at least a month down there, if not longer,” Reyna concluded, her eyes glittering like cut jewels as she studied nothing in particular. Percy had to admit that, despite her rough, haggard appearance and lack of any real curves (it was mostly muscled bulk and not soft skin), she was rather beautiful, like how a lioness might be beautiful in that calculating, predatory way. It sent shivers up and down his arms as she leveled her gaze in his direction. “Lilith could’ve performed all sorts of toxic experiments by now.”

“Thanks for your optimism,” Piper snapped, her multicolored eyes flashing, but underneath her irritable mask she was clearly panicking, her fingers fiddling with her scrubs as she shifted nervously, unable to sit still. “But we need help, no doubt. It’s just the three of us now, and it’s not like we can just teleport into Hell without an Archangel’s help. Even if we somehow got into the underworld, we can’t just march into Lilith’s palace and demand getting our friends back, and Percy is in no state to face Luke and get his wings back by himself.” Percy wanted to get offended by that, since she was basically announcing that he was weak, but he couldn’t manage to grow angry; every single word that fell from her mouth was truth, or at least _sounded like_ truth.

Piper continued, her tone sounding more and more disheartened by the second, “Lilith is far more powerful in Hell, more powerful than ever before,” She glanced around warily, as if she’d somehow summon the demoness just by saying her name aloud, “When the others tried to confront her in the warehouse, they’d technically had the upper hand, since it was the human world. Her husband, Mr. Satan himself, can’t give her strength from his place in Tartarus if she’s walking the Earth, but even in her weakened state, she is still impossibly strong.” Percy was nodding along with her, and Reyna had gone pale as their incredibly meager odds were laid out before them, and Piper gave her a look of sympathy before going on, “But now she has the home field advantage. Hell is her domain, at least, it’s her husband’s domain. Not only is she more powerful as a demon, but she’s practically a god as Lucifer gives her scraps of his power. No doubt he’s on high alert now that she has intentions of raising him from the pit. Let’s just say she was a shark, a huge Great White. That last battle was as if she was flopping on the shore while we kicked her, but even then she was able to bite us. Imagine if it was just us in the ocean, where the shark is strongest, and we had no boat, just our bare hands, and on top of that someone was giving the shark cyborg parts to enhance its abilities.”

“We’d be dead meat,” Reyna finished with a sigh. “We _are_ dead meat.”

“Precisely. Any ideas? Anyone?” Piper asked, her voice a little breathy as she buried her face in her hands. Everyone was being pushed to the breaking point, Percy included, and he felt completely helpless as he ran his hands through his hair and across his face, as if that would somehow trigger a genius plan that had a 100% chance of success. “We can’t risk the lives of mortals who are already unfamiliar with what lies in the spiritual realms, so no mercenaries. We need fallen angel help, or even angels that are just hanging around. Even then, this is a suicide mission, and it’s highly unlikely that they’d risk their lives for a handful of mortals and a fallen angel.”

“I think I know someone,” Percy announced suddenly, his expression morphing into one of shock. In his heart was the faintest glimmer of hope, and it was clear that it showed on his face, because Reyna and Piper perked up as well. He really hoped that it wasn't pulverized, though, because that would really suck ass (It would also mean that he and all of his friends were slaughtered in the fight against Lilith, but that was unimportant). He put his training as a messenger angel to good use, and in seconds he was racing out the door, ignoring the vertigo that slammed into him, with Reyna and Piper hard on his heels.  He tried to stave of the dread that had curled up and nestled within his gut; that would just plant the seed of doubt, and doubt was the one thing that he couldn’t have when he was going on a suicide mission.

 

\----Ω----

 

            It was dark by the time they got to the warehouse, which was located at the edge of the city. It was even farther out than the Whisper and Lilith’s headquarters on Earth, and the highway to freedom led out of the city and onto the horizon, where it disappeared over the crest of a hill. Many had walked that road to their liberty, but many others stayed rooted behind, either unwilling or chained to the ground. It was very sadistic once Percy really thought about it; freedom just at your fingertips yet so, so far away. People stayed because they needed money and the nearest town was ten miles out. They stayed because they’d obligated themselves to gangs or jobs. People stayed because they had to settle a wager. People stayed because they had friends and family. But most of all, they stayed because they had known nothing else in their lives, and what was out there was a whole new world that was scary and unexplored, yet little did they know the wonders that lay beyond.

The road was lonesome, cracked and bumpy, with scraggly bushes and crooked, dying trees flanking it, and a solitary crow cried out somewhere in the distance. It added a bit to the atmosphere; abandoned by society, yet clearly inhabited by the misfits that it’d cast out. Trash littered the sidewalk, from cigarette butts to empty soda cans that had been crushed by someone’s fist or feet. If Percy looked back, he could see the gradual evolution of the sagging buildings into better, newer ones as the street delved deeper into the inner city. The structures here, though, were like decaying bodies, their cracked windows staring at the trio emptily as their footsteps echoed throughout the city. Nosy eyes regarded them closely from the dark alleys, and their shadows flitted here and there, blotting out the dull yellow light that seeped out of the street lights. It would’ve been late afternoon, but the clouds made it so much darker, and Percy felt exposed out in the open, though he calmed a bit as his two very strong companions flanked him.

The unlikely team picked their way around Dominion Road, watching every dark spot closely with increased wariness. A black cat prowled across their path, its ebony pelt glossy and gleaming as it regarded them with yellow lamp-like eyes that seemed to glow in the dark. With a hiss of annoyance or perhaps of warning, it scampered to the other side of the road and dissolved into the shadows beyond, and the hairs on Percy’s arms and neck stood straight up at the bad omen. A trashcan toppled over as the wind became more violent, and everyone jumped, drawing the guns that they’d salvaged from the Golden Swords’ weapon room, though it had been very eerie and depressing experience the headquarters empty. The tension hung so thick in the air that Percy could almost breathe it in, but you could never get too jumpy when it came to finding yourself your own army to trudge through Hell and back with you…literally. The clouds obscured the stars and the moon, which would just begin to peek out as of that moment as the sun dipped below the horizon. A plane must’ve flown past, judging from very loud cacophony in the dead silence, and as the sound of its engines faded, Percy felt a twinge of sadness. He could fly like that once, maybe fly even faster, but he forced himself to swat away the thought before his mind retreated to darker places.

“Where are we going?” Reyna questioned hesitantly, her fear well-masked but still very much present. Percy was surprised that she trusted them enough to bring her this far and have her not know their destination; for all she knew, the two fallen angels would gang up on her and leave her corpse in a ditch somewhere. He really had to applaud her, because in her shoes, he would’ve bailed way before then.

“You’ll see,” Percy replied, and Piper cast him a wary glance out of the corner of her eye. She, too, was in the dark about this whole thing, but Percy could see the gears turning in her head as she put the pieces together, slowly, but surely. Her expression was cold and hard, hiding the raging tempest that lay underneath, and Percy was able to figure out the exact moment when she knew where they were going, and the spark of anxiety in her eyes made him wonder if this was such a good idea after all. Allowing Piper to take the lead, Percy fell into step next to Reyna, who was having a hard time keeping it together.

“I know it’s none of my business,” he began, and Reyna looked up at him sharply, but there was no anger that fueled the motion, just anticipation. “But I was just wondering why you hid instead of confronting Luke and Lilith?” Reyna’s shoulders sagged, and he struggled to cover himself, “It’s not like it’s a bad thing, since any sane person would run, but it just doesn’t seem in your nature to back out.” He kept his words soft and understanding. If he was able to take Reyna’s mind off of what was currently going on, perhaps it would ease her nerves a bit. He always found that talking made him forget what was happening, and he hoped that it would also apply to Reyna. Reyna tried to keep her expression stern, but her poker face had crumbled long ago.

“Listen, I know you’re just trying to take my mind off of this,” Percy’s face fell, but she soldiered on, “But before you can know why I’m such a wreck about this whole situation, you have to know what happened to me…before.”

“Before you joined the Golden Swords?” Percy asked, and Reyna nodded solemnly.

“You can’t speak a word of this to anyone else, okay? I’ve chosen a few people to share with, but I’m not going to tell you who so you can’t discuss it out loud.” Percy was well aware of her closeness to Annabeth, it was the reason she was second-in-command, after all, and the blonde no doubt new the story, but the fallen messenger angel granted Reyna the illusion of secrecy to ease her nerves. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes as she told him, “My sister, Hylla, and I…Well, the first time we arrived in this city we had no idea how things worked. The two of us thought that it was just a run-down town, unaware of what really went on. We were so…naïve back then. We shouldn’t’ve been too surprised when a group of Candymen arrived at our doorstep and took us away. Luckily we were able to escape before any true harm had been done, but they still managed to keep us in their horrible lair for three whole days. They kept us as servants to do all of their dirty work, and when you said that they were probably being kept as servants, I started to lose it.” Silence ensued, and Percy was aware of the pained expression on Reyna’s face. After a long stretch of time she sighed, “Hylla just joined a local misandrist gang, and she’s risen to leader. They call themselves the Amazons, and they go around beating up all of the males and making them subservient. Now I’m alone with nothing to lose.”

Percy didn’t comment as to not upset Reyna any further. He knew how angry she could get, and her wrath was not something that one would want to witness, and it would only be provoked if he offered her pity or sympathy towards a thing that he hadn’t lived through. So instead, he stayed silent, knowing that that’s what he personally would’ve wanted if he’d been sharing his secrets to Reyna. They walked in silence for a while, and the next time he looked up, they were right in front of the warehouse. He hoped that this certain one was still where they all hung out, because it was coming close to a year since he had monitored this city as a messenger angel. They may have moved or something, but it was highly unlikely since there were so many of them. This particular warehouse was known to most as the Necropolis, since anyone unauthorized who ventured inside was as good as dead. An uncountable amount of fallen angels, ranging from angels of art and beauty to angels of death, lived within that building, and he could feel the steady waves of power that ebbed from it. Even strays were smart enough to steer clear.

 All of those who lived in the Necropolis disapproved of angels and least slightly, though not all were spiteful towards Heaven. There were a few acquaintances of Percy’s hidden amongst the ranks, and he knew that it was time to collect favors, which he hadn’t done since the dawn of time itself. The favors had certainly piled high, and he knew that almost all of the fallen angels refuging in the Necropolis owed him something; he’d been the messenger of Michael, after all, and had had some access to a whole load of information that they couldn’t even begin to dream of having access to.

            That’s when a piece of paper skidded across his path, and he stooped down to pick it up, expecting it to be a grocery list or something. Instead he was met with the horrible word: **MISSING**. The piece of paper read:

 

**_Have you seen Jason Grace?_ **

**_Age: Seventeen_ **

**_Hair color: Blond_ **

**_Eye color: Blue_ **

**_Skin color: Caucasian_ **

**_Notable features: Scar on his upper lip_ **

**_Last seen: Roughly a month ago, when his sister left on a trip and he stayed back home._ **

**_If seen or encountered, call his sister Thalia Grace at 213-567-8878_ **

****

 

            Percy was at a loss for words. Below the text there was a picture of Jason smiling into the camera. The lines of worry and tiredness had not yet etched themselves into his face. He seemed almost…peaceful. He looked so happy, so carefree, and the picture had obviously been taken very recently, after Percy’s wings had been sold; before then, they hadn’t even been able to afford a camera, much less take a picture with one. Percy had completely forgotten that Jason had a sister who had been expecting him home by the end of the week. Now Percy had dragged him into this entire mess, a horrible web of impossible quests and dreams that had ensnared them all, and the spider was starting to get a bit peckish. His emotions thickened with resolve; he would do anything for his friends, anything at all. If it meant never getting his wings back in order to save them, he would do it.

            The addiction suddenly screeched for more of the wretched drug, completely coming from out of nowhere, and he doubled over, a fit of coughing wracking his body. Reyna and Piper rushed over, and the fallen healing angel injected another dose of heroin into his veins using one of the many syringes that she’d brought along in case something exactly like this happened. He nearly protested, but he wanted to be the very best for all of his friends; might as well burn brightly for a short period and go out with a bang than slowly dim and dissipate into nothingness. He could feel himself getting stronger as the drug took effect; adrenaline pumped through his veins, and he felt like he could achieve anything that was thrown at him. Then again, he knew that once this high wore off he’d be even more crippled than before.

            He marched off towards the Necropolis, Jason’s missing poster lost to the wind behind him.

 

\----Ω----

 

            This was not one of Grover Underwood’s best times. Sure, he had fallen years ago since he’d refused his Calling as an angel of art and beauty, but it still haunted him at night. The scars on his back still ached from where Archangel Uriel had sawed off his brindle wings, and phantom pains wracked his body as if the appendages were still attached and aching. The idea of falling was supposed to scare angels into obedience, and it worked for most; they kept in line because they wanted to keep their wings, and it didn’t help that Archangel Uriel, de-winged unruly and disobedient angels in public where everyone could see. Then he kicked the now-fallen angel out of Heaven, where they fell and fell and fell for what seemed like forever, until they smashed into the ground at a speed that would’ve caused humans to splatter all over the place.

            Grover had lain at the site of his falling for a day or two, trying to get over the shock of both the impact and the loss of his wings. Then other fallen angels had found him and brought him to the Necropolis, and for the first time in his immortal life he felt accepted. The group of fallen angels that resided in the Necropolis, a large warehouse on the outskirts of a crumbling city infested with crime and drug dealers, was a nameless gang. They didn’t have to be friends with one another, they just had to work in tandem to live to the next day. It was much like a wolf pack, and the alpha was a very feisty angel of fire named Rachel Elizabeth Dare.

            Her hair was a mass of red-orange curls that looked like fire whenever she stepped into the sunlight, and her sharp green eyes were alight with cold intelligence. She was by far the oldest of all the fallen angels, though she looked the youngest. Some say that she was created at the beginning of time itself and was secretly a sister of the Archangels. Though her wings were gone, her powers weren’t. Whenever someone or something angered her, her eyes set ablaze. Literally. Flames lapped and crackled out of her sockets whenever she was irritated in the slightest, and they were all lucky that this didn’t usually happen around humans.

            All of the fallen angels in the ragtag group were frightened of her, though Grover knew her very well. She was just pretending to be menacing in order to make sure that she wasn’t crossed by her fellow fallen angels or by any enemies she may have; a leader to be seen as hard and merciless was better than one who was thought to be soft and easily manipulated. In truth, however, Rachel had been a part of Grover’s military garrison, and she was really very dorky and approachable, though she could have a sharp tongue when needed. The fire angel had dismissed the rumors of her being a sister of the Archangels, but allowed everyone’s imaginations to run wild about her backstory, though she gave little away about the life she once had in Heaven. This gang was specifically made to accommodate and help fallen angels adjust to life on Earth, but one of their main goals was to uproot the secrets of the other gang in town, the Golden Swords. Little was known about them or what they did, but Rachel was determined to know, considering all of the whispers that floated about and the fear that permeated the air when the name was uttered. It certainly wasn’t like the other more prominent gangs; as far as they could tell, the members all had a clean record. In fact, it was a bit too clean. They were of smaller number than the group of fallen angels, but it was rumored that they had superior skill, strength, and intellect and could be compared to demigods, their abilities nearly topping those of angels, both divine and fallen.

            That specific day was a rather fateful one, though nobody knew that yet. Grover had just roused from his small area on the floor on the east side of the warehouse, which was crammed with sleeping bags of all shapes, sizes, and colors. The rest of the Necropolis had been piled high with empty crates, but they’d pushed them to the side to make more room, using it as storage. Despite the fact that the sun had just dipped below the horizon, the factory was alive with activity. Some fallen angels slept or read (with little need for light) in their sleeping bags, while other others lounged in the patches of moonlight offered by the holes in the roof. All of the talking was hushed, though, and a few had even managed to clamber onto ledges created by the crates, their legs dangling over the side as they conversed in hushed tones. Grover didn’t really have any friends besides Rachel, since most considered him an oddball, but she was always busy with organizing the group, which could be pretty difficult since very single one of them was a rebel; that didn’t really fare well for coming to compromises or dishing out orders. Rachel could be scary, though, and things managed to get done. At the moment she was distributing a late dinner, which consisted of canned beans and small bottles of water. It was very hard to sustain such a big group of outcast celestial beings, who were constantly complaining about hunger and thirst, but somehow they succeeded.

            “Gotcha!” Grover snapped as he quickly slapped away Travis Stoll’s hand; the fallen messenger angel had been trying to steal his belt, which would’ve resulted in a very humiliating pantsing, but Grover had sharp senses and quick reflexes, which caught the trickster every time. Despite his kleptomaniac nature, Travis was one of the few artificially fallen in the group, which was a surprise since you’d think he would’ve been tossed out of Heaven long before for stealing. Then again, he probably didn’t ever get caught. Travis’ wings gigantic white wings had been cut off by what he’d claimed to be demons in disguise; their bodies humanoid but their faces concealed by golden masks that were shaped to look like animal heads. Grover was rather jealous of him; at least he had an alibi. Grover didn’t. He was fallen and that was that; he had disobeyed the laws of Heaven and this was his eternal punishment.

            Travis snickered but his expression fell when Katie Gardener, a fallen angel of nature, came storming over with a half-eaten chocolate bunny in her hand. “STOLL!” she bellowed and one in question darted away like a child avoiding punishment, with Katie in hot pursuit. He was pretty sure that Katie was a regular fallen, punished for coming in direct contact with humans without permission. It was something like that, though Grover didn’t really know her very well. He should, though, because she is, was, an angel of nature, and if he was going to move any further in his studies, he should probably consult with someone who’d actually been experienced in the field. He felt that it was stupid he’d been cast out for not abiding by his Calling; it was like being forced into a job that he hated and, when trying to find a new job, he’d been rejected by society and carved out of the picture. If he ever saw another angel he’d have to have a word with them about how unfair it all was.

            As Grover sat, propped up on the wall with everything below his torso swaddled in his sleeping bag, he couldn’t help but feel hopelessly bored. Hours seemed to drag on and on here, and every day was exactly like the day before it; he’d been traveling with the group for a time that was by no means considered small, but he couldn’t help but wonder if this was what it was going to be like for the rest of his life. Going through the motions as Rachel stood around barking orders and handing out chores for everyone to do, and despite the fact that the roles switched every day, there was a very, very distinct monotony:

Wake up.

Get clean in the nearby public shower (which was about twenty blocks away and incredibly filthy).

Eat breakfast.

Do chores.

Eat lunch.

Do more chores.

Eat dinner.

Free time.

All fallen angels must be back in the Necropolis by 10:30 p.m.

Curfew at 11:30.

Repeat.

The only days that he looked forward to had to be holidays, which were days off despite the fact that the group of fallen angels refused to celebrate any religious ones out of spite. There was also food duty, which involved raiding homes, and it was beyond hysterical to see the shocked looks on humans’ faces as the intruders moved faster than their eyes could process. Don’t worry about morals, though; they only stole from those who had excess food and thought they had the right to turn away beggars at their door. Even then, there really wasn’t much thrill in breaking into a house and looting the fridge if you’ve done it an uncountable amount of times. Most said that Grover thrust this boredom upon himself; during free time many fallen angels left the Necropolis to “go out” which was a code word for “break the law and get away with it because we’re fallen angels”, and Rachel chided him and told him that he should be more social. He didn’t feel like mugging old ladies on the streets, thank you very much, and thus kept to sitting around doing nothing. Sure, he could go out and perhaps steal some books from the library, but the libraries were struggling already and they didn’t need to deal with more theft of their books on top of the theft that there already was. See? He wasn’t a bad guy just because he was a fallen angel, contrary to popular belief.

The only recent thing that had been at least mildly interesting was when Grover was stuck on cleanup crew with Silena Beauregard and Clarisse La Rue. On top of the fact that he was with two girls and not a single boy, he was dealing with Clarisse La Rue, the daughter of the commander who was only bested in military rank by Archangels. Grover was talking about Ares, of course, and anyone related to _that_ guy was destined to have some sort of record. Heck, Ares himself was nearly cast out of Heaven on multiple occasions, for things that were much worse than wanting to change his Calling. Back to Clarisse, rumor had it that she’d been so close to starting World War III that the Archangels had considered banishing her into Hell like they did with the original third that fell from Heaven, but she had gotten off the hook. She had been an angel of power, and they weren’t called that just because it sounded cool. They controlled the outcomes of the greatest wars and even provoked them if necessary.

            Silena was okay, but she mostly kept to herself. She had had ties in Heaven, being the girlfriend of an angel of fire named Charles Beckendorf. Grover always wondered why they chose last names, which were utterly useless. Then again, he had a last name, but only because it was necessary in order to blend in with society. Silena had been an angel of art and beauty, related to the infamous Piper McLean, both who were fallen. Bad luck seemed to run in the family, and they all descended from the very popular angel model (don’t judge, Heaven had magazines too) Aphrodite. There were other angels who were as powerful as her, including Ares (who was the one courting Aphrodite), Hades, Poseidon, and a bunch of others. They were all just one step below Archangels. Almost all of their descendants, though, had the worst of luck that Heaven had ever seen.

            He recalled what Clarisse had said that morning, which had really freaked him out, “There’s something going on in this town. Something very bad.”

            “Like what?” Grover asked, picking up empty water bottles and aluminum cans that were scattered in and around the warehouse, though that was only after they’d scrubbed the fresh graffiti from the walls. Silena was silent, but the two other fallen angels had been keen to voice their complaints as loudly as possible, and Grover envied her infinite patience, though she was simply missing her boyfriend and her home. Many fallen angels were like that; always withdrawing into the recesses of their mind to think about the good old days, and Silena was one of the milder cases. There were some that wouldn’t even speak, their eyes glazed as they stared off into nothing and longed for their wings.

            “My celestial senses are going wacko,” she grunted, bending over and eying the cigarette but disdainfully. “There is, was, a huge force here, and even the remnants of its stay is sending my radar into a fucking frenzy. Hell, you felt that surge, too; someone passed through worlds, and that means that whatever was here was either fucking _massive_ or just incredibly, incredibly powerful. My guess is on the latter.”

            “Well there are a bunch of fallen angels hanging around,” Grover snorted, though he couldn’t help the wariness that was leaking into his tone.

            “No, I’ve long since gotten used to that. This was a spike, though. Like, if the power of all of us was an atomic bomb, then this thing was the Big Bang,” Clarisse remarked, her brown eyes sharp in the mid-afternoon light. She had her father’s looks, sadly; her features very brutish and to some would be considered downright horrid, but from Grover’s point of view she was pretty in a regal, predatory way, like a lioness.

            “You sure?” Silena piped up, her brows furrowing, and the two other fallen angels exchanged a look; if Silena decided that something was worth her words, it was either incredibly exciting or pretty damn bad. “Maybe you should report it to Rachel.”

            “I will,” Clarisse replied, her jaw set. They resumed their cleaning in silence.

Grover shivered as he recalled the experience, and hoped Clarisse had found the time to get a hold of Rachel to commune about the whole thing. They would hold a meeting, which consisted of all the “counselors” of a certain type of angels (Travis for messenger angels, Katie for angels of nature, Clarisse for angels of power, Silena for angels of art and beauty, Lou Ellen for angels of death, and Rachel herself for fire angels) and discuss the issue. It would take a while, but at least it would be done. He saw Clarisse nearby, chatting up a storm with a feisty angel of nature named Calypso, and wriggled his way out of his sleeping bag to go talk to her. Now, he wouldn’t normally initiate conversation with anyone other than a close friend (Rachel), and that rule certainly applied to someone such as Clarisse La Rue, but he was desperate to find out how the leader of the ragtag gang of fallen angels was going to act. He’d just risen to his feet when the whole of the Necropolis fell silent.

The doors swung open and three people were silhouetted against the moonlight spilling into the warehouse, their faces cloaked in shadow. The only parts of them that could be distinguished from the dark masses were their eyes, which glittered coldly. Three sets of the raked over the crowd of assembled fallen angels; black, green, and a mixture of all the different colors regarded them with indifference. One of them stepped towards the front and everyone inhaled sharply as his true identity was revealed; without the moonlight making the shadows on his face more pronounced, his features became recognizable. Grover had been very good friends with him before he fell, and he wasn’t sure what he was seeing.

Percy had been his best friend in Heaven before he fell, and Grover had felt bad that the messenger angel was getting even more of a bad rep for hanging out with a troublemaker, on top of the prejudice that he was faced with for his black wings. They’d done everything together as fledglings, even as Percy trained to try out to become Michael’s messenger angel and relieve Gabriel of his duties (since the Archangel had other things to do than fly this way and that delivering his brother’s scrolls), and Grover had stood up to him when the teacher, Ms. Dodds, used Percy’s wings as an example of what a demon’s would look like. Even then his friend had broken down in front of the whole class.

_“Don’t be mean!” Grover shouted as a group of kids, led by Nancy Bobofit, shouted hurtful names at Percy, whose hunched form was taking it all silently from his seat._

_Ms. Dodds looked stricken when she realized what she just done and Percy began to cry, burying his face in his hands, and curling his wings around himself to try and disappear._

_“Antichrist!”_

_“Demon-spawn!”_

_"Hell-raiser!”_

_“Lucifer worshipper!”_

_The teacher ended it at that last comment and sent the fledgling who’d shouted it to the principal’s office, though not once did she apologize. The only reason she put an end to it was because she risked losing her job and falling from Heaven; calling an angel all of these names was punishable by exile, and the only reason that the kids that day didn’t fall was because “they were young and didn’t know better”. Grover still remembers whisking Percy home and letting him cry on his shoulder, his wings wrapping around his friend in reassurance. The messenger angel had refused to cry after that, and had soon began hurling insults right back, earning him countless expulsions. The instigators were never punished because their wings were normal colors._

            Grover shook his head clear and allowed the joy to swell up beneath his ribcage. Percy was here. It didn’t matter how or why, but he was here, and Grover hadn’t seen him for what felt like eternities. He wanted to run over and hug him, wanted to tell him all about his studies and his life here and ask so many questions, but something stopped him. He took a few moments to search behind Percy for his signature black wings, which were usually dark smudges behind him that seemed to suck in all light, but saw none. His heart almost stopped when he realized what that entailed; it could only really mean one thing.

He took in a shaky breath as the fallen messenger angel walked towards the center of the room, the two other figures trailing behind him like shadows. The fallen angels parted for him, whispering in hushed voices that were too numerous for Grover to listen in on their conversations. Grover was fairly sure he recognized Piper McLean’s face, but he couldn’t be sure since it turned out her head was shrouded in a loose hoodie. He had no idea who the other companion could be, and she didn’t give off an aura of any sort. A human? When did the mighty Perseus become associated with humans?

            “Rachel,” the black-haired boy greeted solemnly with a slight incline of his head. Very un-Percy-like. Sure, they’d grown apart as the messenger angel’s life was consumed by work, but he was never this polite outside of his job. The fallen fire angel acknowledged him with a terse handshake, but did not reply. Perseus raised his voice, “I have come to collect my debts.” Almost everyone, including Grover and Rachel, sucked in a breath. Nearly all of them were indebted to Perseus in some way, shape, or form, and nobody had ever expected him to collect them. It must’ve been very serious if, after all these years, he was coming now, and on top of the fact that his wings were nowhere to be found. Had he rebelled? Was he found by those masked demons that Travis had described? Grover couldn’t be sure, because Percy’s face was a mask. He couldn’t even read his best friend anymore. It’d been too long.

            “I am dying,” he announced, and Grover’s stomach dropped like a leaden ball. “But that doesn’t matter, because there are several people enslaved by Lilith herself down in Hell that are very dear to me. I need an army to get them back, though. If it helps ease your nerves you’ll be able to beat the living crap out of the Queen of Hell if we succeed, but all of those who are in my debt _must_ come along, though I will accept volunteers from those who are not. We will literally dine in Hell tonight.” There was a chorus of cheering and anxious murmurs, but nobody dared to object. The murderous gleam in Perseus’s eyes was becoming quite unnerving, and a wicked smile split his face like a crack in a sidewalk.


	18. The Shadows Rising Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the support and for your kudos. Please comment so I can get this story to be better, but I can feel that it's winding down. Don't worry, I still have a couple of Timestamps and a Sequel planned!

**** _Archangel Michael stood poised at the steps of his palace, his eyes trained on where the marble stairs were engulfed by the depths of an ominous mist; an endless, roiling mass that engulfed anything and everything it touched. It was advancing, slowly but surely, and Michael’s chest tightened as yet another step disappeared into the churning nothingness, which was blacker than the typical grey of mist and practically radiating sinister. Lightning riddled the murky, overcast sky, and thunder bellowed to the south. The storm was right on top of him, and if that was the biggest issue at hand, the Archangel would’ve worried about the fact that he was decked in his metal battle armor, a near-perfect conductor for electricity. His fists clenched as he regarded the tossing shadows that lurked just behind the veil of fog, the blazing red eyes that glared at him from the depths and the occasional flash of scales. He knew it was time. He felt Hazel’s presence by his side, waves of fear pulsing off of her, and despite her terror, she was firm when staring death in the face._

_“He’s coming,” Michael murmured to no one in particular, and he was acutely aware of Hazel’s sharp intake of breath at the comment, the way her heart roared ever more fiercely in her chest, and yet she refused to run away. Refused to take shelter within the palace like what remained of Heaven’s population had done. She was a sturdy rock by his side, a never-ending force that would forever help Michael propel himself forwards. It was a pity he wouldn’t live long enough to tell her that. He refused to tear his eyes away from the kaleidoscopic blackness that swam before him, and out of the corner of his eye he could see the messenger angel’s wings fluttering anxiously. His own stayed folded behind his back, unmoving. Solemn._

_“What are you to do, sir?” she asked, her voice small and quivering with fear, though Archangel Michael was very surprised at how little it showed on her face. Hazel was brave, braver than most angels in situations like these, and he was blessed to have someone like her as his messenger. A sword named Longing skewered him as the memories of Perseus rose up like a wave and crashed down over his mind, consuming it._

_Green eyes that crinkled at the corners._

_Lopsided grins._

_Jet black hair and feathers, both which never seemed the least bit tidy._

_The single blue rose that lay on the bed of a room that hadn’t been opened in eons._

_Michael nearly keeled over when he realized that that room would never be entered again. The sun had long since engulfed and destroyed Earth, taking humanity, who’d tried and failed to evade their demise, with it, and God had granted the fallen angels the mercy of the grave, though they would never rebirth. Their afterlife was nothingness. They were simply gone, their essences destroyed as the very fabric of the Earth was scorched away, destroyed by the very star that had given it life. Percy had been amongst those fallen angels, and no matter how much Michael had begged, how much he’d pleaded for his Father to bring back the artificially fallen, his cries fell upon dead ears._

_The angels had moved on to focus their attention on the pylomines, who resided in a world that God had created not long ago and were just in their first stages of evolution, unaware of the fact that they would become even more successful than the humans. The angels had chosen to retain their human forms instead of assuming the ones of the pylomines, but the fallen angels who were cast down were forced to change and blend in, though Heaven made well sure of the fact that this race of intelligence had no idea that they actually existed (in order to prevent any more artificially fallen). God created an Eighth Heaven so that the deceased pylomines and the humans could remain apart, and eventually Yllah, the world on which the pylomines had flourished, died too._

_This was a cycle. The angels had to have changed worlds millions of times, watching species grow, live, and die out. Heaven was constantly expanding, with new trends such as changing forms to look like a certain species popping up, which many embraced. Not Archangel Michael, though. No, he remained in his original form. The form that had inspired God to create the humans in the image that was in the likeness of the eldest Archangel. The form that reminded him of his lost love._

_He clung to anything he could find, since he’d closed up Perseus’ room for good, taking everything that he’d thought would help jog the Archangel’s memory. He looked at pictures that were faded and yellowed, which he’d gotten from Poseidon and Sally many millennia ago, and yet Michael soon found out that no, an Archangel’s memory was not infinite. There were so many things, so many people and so many angels and so many new species and Heavens to remember. His mind thought it was unnecessary to keep up the reminiscence of a long lost messenger and possible mate. There was one day that Michael woke up forgetting what Percy’s voice sounded like, and no matter how many videos the Archangel watched from Poseidon and Sally’s extensive collection, it wouldn’t stick. Another day, Michael woke up unable to picture the exact color of Percy’s eyes unless he looked at a source. Yet another time, Michael had to ask who Percy was when he was casually reading one of the Metatron’s tablets._

_He was forgetting. He was frantically keeping Percy alive, frantically trying to hold on, but his messenger was drifting farther and farther away from him. Zoë gave him an odd, unknowing look when he mentioned Percy in one of their conversations. The messenger angel’s parents had three other children and had either donated or given all of Percy’s stuff to Michael. They remembered him occasionally, wistfully, but they had new lives. Lives that Percy wasn’t a part of. Michael forgot about Percy for centuries at a time and then cried himself to sleep for years straight because he'd been so selfish to do so._

You’re the one who’s supposed to be upholding his memory! _a voice in his head screamed,_ You can’t even do that right!

_"You’re healing,” Raphael had said with a knowing look. “You have to move on.”_

_But no, Michael couldn’t. He clung to Percy with all of his might, but the messenger angel was growing distant, walking away into the darkness that was the world of forgotten memories. Time marched on even though it was leaving Percy behind, and Michael desperately wanted to stop it in its tracks so that he could run back for his messenger angel. No matter how much Michael sobbed for Percy to come back, screamed for him to listen and come home, the black-feathered angel’s footsteps began to fade. As of that moment, he was but a speck in the distance, and Michael could do nothing but watch him go. Now the end had come, and Michael hoped that in the nothingness he would be able to find Percy._

_It took a long time before he realized that Hazel had spoken to him and was regarding him with a look of measured patience, though the terror was still screeching behind her eyes. He paused to recall the question, and then replied, “I will fight him.”_

_“But sir! You can’t! You mustn’t!” Hazel cried, her anxiety rising. Michael turned to her, his eyes lighting up icy blue as another bolt of lightning streaked across the sky._

_“Are you to control what I can and cannot do?” he demanded sternly in the softest voice possible, which made it all the more intense. Hazel inclined her head, her jaw set._

_“No, sir.”_

_“Then you best be off. Take everyone and fly, fly far away and never return!” Hazel’s eyes were wide as saucers, her façade of bravery shattered and in pieces on the ground, and the Archangel knew what he was asking her to do. It was suicide, complete and utter suicide; she was to lead the survivors away from the darkness. It would continue to extend for eternity, and she and her mate and everyone else would have to run forever. They could settle down for a few eons, but eventually they’d see the cloud of nothing in the distance and would have to take off. They would be the last of the angels; they’d multiply, perhaps even get the numbers back up to what they’d once been, but they’d have to continue to run away from the shadows that were slowly inching over the universe. Perhaps some demons, those who hadn’t joined Michael’s brother’s cause, would get the idea and run as well. Perhaps the two species that had long since been at war could join forces to flee together, and their combined strength could help usher the masses on._

_All of the archives were destroyed, and they couldn’t afford to have possessions weighing them down, so stories had to be relayed through word of mouth, ad no matter how much they strayed from the original version, at least some of this dying universe’s history would be preserved. He didn’t know whether there was a limit to how far the reaches of the multiverse extended, but he could only pray that the angels and the demons could keep running until they couldn’t run anymore. That time will inevitable come, when they hit a barrier and will have to either watch the Nothing approach them or run into it headfirst with joined hands, and in that moment the angels and demons would be destroyed. Like the humans. Like the pylomines. Like the rest of the species Heaven had watched over. Like all of the souls that had withered and succumbed to the Nothing._

_Like Michael’s brothers._

_Angels were the last beings in the universe, and even though God lay untouched, he could do nothing to prevent the spread of the Nothing. Everything had an end. This was the end of, well,_ everything. _Hazel hesitated for a few moments too long, bidding Michael farewell with her eyes and pleading for him to come along with them, but the Archangel could only shake his head. The heartbreak was plain on her face as she hugged him tightly, the low sob rising in her throat choked down, and Michael lay a reassuring hand on her shoulder before she dashed through the doors, her hair whipping behind her and her face set with determination. He knew she wouldn’t fail. Michael watched as she vanished across the threshold of his palace, which would eventually be engulfed along with Michael, and hoped that the Creator lit Hazel’s path and the paths of the huddled masses she would command, wherever they led._

_Michael allowed his eyes to slip closed, the wind howling and buffeting him and the sound of rolling thunder ripping through the air. When the Archangel opened them again, there he was._

_Standing in front of him, his face dripping with rain and his eyes like shards of ice, was Lucifer._

_“I’ve come home to you, brother,” the former Archangel murmured. Michael raised his sword and his younger brother hissed and backed up a few steps, his expression infinitely calculating and wary. Under his armor, which was as black as night, Michael noted the rippling, corded muscles, as well as the strong, callused hands that could easily snap bones and tear flesh._

_“You are no longer welcome here,” Archangel Michael boomed, his blue eyes blazing like the fires which Lucifer had emerged from. “And I am no longer your brother.” Lucifer tilted his head to the side thoughtfully, like a predator pondering whether it should toy with its prey first, and his face contorted into a sneer. Michael was well aware that the Destroyer was not, indeed, the Nothing that was slowly destroying the universe. Instead, with his army of shadows that was less alive than the substance they were conjured from, he aided it. In the long run, he was being merciful; destroying and killing things before the Nothing got to them first, but his path of carnage was hardly heroic._

_“Are you really so willing to fight for this wretched place?” he snarled, his broken, maimed wings flaring behind him. The darkness consumed another step of the palace stairs. “Fight so that your little group of angels can escape?” He gestured with his chin and Michael turned to see thousands of angels taking off into the sky behind the palace, desperately propelling themselves towards the undisturbed blue that lay beyond. He saw some carrying people with injured wings, saw widows clutching fledglings to their chests, and most of all, he saw Hazel and Frank, hands clasped together, leading everyone into the unknown. Into the light that lay beyond. Michael noted the fact that some faces still peered through the windows of the palace; the weak and the old and those who’d simply accepted their fates. Michael respected them for staying behind, respected them for knowing that they would only slow everyone down as they desperately propelled themselves towards freedom. He only wished he could be there to guide them, but he knew that Hazel and Frank would make exceptional leaders._

_“I am willing to lay down my wings if it means keeping my people far, far away from here,” the Archangel hissed in reply, gesturing to the mist before them. His muscles seized up as Lucifer cracked his neck, fangs beginning to slide out of his gums, a result of the corruption he’d faced within the depths of Tartarus. Michael caught a glimpse of the number 666 tattooed on his neck, and he found it rather amusing that he was wearing his own number, though that humor was still incredibly muted by the wave of unfathomable fear that coursed through him._

_“Then I guess we’ll have to settle it like we did in the old days,” Lucifer’s voice had shifted so that it was now several octaves lower, consisting of several voices that all hissed in unison whenever he spoke. “Going to beat down your little brother yet again?”_

_“I am prepared,” Michael snapped fiercely, spreading his shimmering wings and demanding submission, demanding that Lucifer step down. His pride, notwithstanding, had still been preserved during his time in Tartarus, and the fallen Archangel mimicked his older brother, his wings, though damaged, almost twice as large as Michael’s when fanned out. There was no questioning that he’d once been God’s favorite. The respectful, playful, curious younger brother of everyone in Heaven, one that everyone loved._

            “Come catch me!” Lucifer squealed, dancing just out of Michael’s reach as the Archangel lunged for him, his face alight with joy. After a few laps around the palace, Michael finally managed to tackle his younger brother around the waist, and they fell in a flurry of laughter and feathers. “You know, for an old guy you’re pretty fast.”

            _When Michael looked up, he couldn’t see the bright, smiling boy that he’d practically raised. No, the angel in front of him was a stranger, and a feeling of self-hatred rose up in him. What did he do wrong? He was responsible for Lucifer’s upbringing, so did that mean that Lucifer’s rebellion was a direct result of Michael’s parenting? He had no idea where he’d went wrong; he’d given Lucifer love and care. He’d been fun like a brother but firm like a father when needed. He’d been Lucifer’s dad, his brother, and his best friend all rolled into one, with help from the rest of his brothers. He must’ve done_ something _wrong, because a person who was all that to someone had to have a huge imprint on them, and in a way, Lucifer’s rebellion was his fault. He tried not to think about that, though, and yet tears welled into his eyes when he saw the cold, hard eyes of an angel who’d once had a gap between his front teeth and a smile that lit up the room. Lucifer’s smirked wickedly, the air suddenly ten degrees colder._

_The darkness inched up another step, a roar echoing from somewhere beyond, and Michael knew that the darkness was Lucifer’s army. Behind it was the Nothing, the void that destroyed everything that it passed over, and Michael’s fear was like nothing ever before. It welled up, building and building and building as Lucifer watched with sickening glee, and then suddenly it was gone._

_A wave of calm washed over the Archangel. Of acceptance. In that moment, he knew that he was ready. He was prepared. He would meet his death with open arms, because there was no way he could fight off Lucifer and his armies alike for eternity. This was a battle that the mightiest of Archangels could not win, and he would eventually fall to his brother’s sword. Just like countless others had done. Just like how his other siblings had done._

When the time comes, take me away, brother, _he prayed to Azrael, who was long dead like everyone else. It still felt nice to think that the Angel of Death would come to bring his soul someplace, wherever that may be. There was no reply, of course, but Michael wanted to believe that he’d heard._

_Suddenly he turned and saw Percy atop one of the spires of the palace, his achingly familiar form silhouetted against the sky, flickering now and then like some sort of apparition. His messenger smiled, his eyes crinkling and his grin just as lopsided as Michael remembered it being, and with a pang he realized that no, he hadn’t forgotten. Percy was still in his head, still guiding his every move, it was just that Michael had finally moved on. He wished that Raphael was here to see his realization, but he was with Azrael. And Uriel. And Gabriel. Mutedly, the Archangel wondered if this was what mortals felt when their internal clock was slowing down, when they knew it would eventually stop ticking altogether._

_Lucifer raised his sword._

_Michael did the same._

_The darkness consumed another step._

\----Ω----

 

            Archangel Michael woke up in a cold sweat, feathers fluttering all around him as he sat bolt upright. Ever since the War in Heaven he’d had nightmares about this, nightmares about his brother’s return from the Ninth Circle, about the end of all things. The blond-haired immortal sighed and covered his face with his hands, breathing hard. They were always so vivid, so painful to endure though. Sometimes he was unaware that they were even dreams at all. His racing heart didn’t seem to know that, and neither did his scattered thoughts. He was just about to flop down of the covers when an insistent rapping came from the door.

            “Come in!” Michael called groggily, expecting his beautiful yet stubborn maid, Zoë, or his very insistent and wise advisor, Chiron, but instead found a nameless, blue-winged messenger at the threshold, her hands on her knees.

            “Urgent news from Archangel Raphael, sir!” she panted in between deep breaths as she held up a rather bedraggled scroll, tied with a golden ribbon. She looked up to see the Archangel in his nightwear. “Oh…uh…” her cheeks reddened. “I’ll come…back later.” The messenger turned to leave, but the Archangel stopped her. Why would Archangel Raphael send him a scroll this early in the morning?

            “Whatever for?” he asked, leaping out of bed. His nightmare dissipated like smoke curling into the wind. The messenger angel shrugged, still very out of breath, and Archangel Michael politely dismissed her after taking the scroll from her outstretched hand. With trembling fingers he began to untie the ribbon, unsure of whether he wanted to know the dreadfulness of the contents. It was amazing how a simple scroll could either build your life up higher than a tower, or shatter it into a million shards like a piece of glass. The Archangel immediately recognized Raphael’s neat, loopy handwriting, the neatest, in fact, of all the Archangels’. Michael had Chiron write scrolls for him, Gabriel rushed too much, Azrael didn’t write at all in order to seem badass and mystical, and of course Uriel wrote in blood which was an entirely different ballgame altogether that the Archangel really didn’t want to explore. The scroll read:

 

_Dear Brother,_

_My messenger was on their way to deliver a scroll to one of my healing angels stationed in Los Angeles. However, when he was flying over a nameless run-down and rather deserted city, she noticed a large group of fallen angels marching through the streets, led by three unidentifiable figures. Even so, they swear that the leader was Perseus, though I wouldn’t think that possible. I wanted to alert you of this due to the fact that this was the largest concentration of fallen angels we’ve seen in millennia, and all of them seemed to be marching in perfect formation, though their destination is a mystery. I suggest you look deeper into this in case there is another rebellion brewing on the horizon._

_Best Regards,_

_Archangel Raphael_

            Alarmed, Michael quickly threw on the nearest clothes, which happened to be a pair of jeans and a T-shirt that said: **After Tuesday even the calendar goes: W T F**. He wrestled a toga over that so passersby didn’t give him odd looks, and fastened on all his armor so quickly that he was pretty sure his greaves were on his arms and his shoulder pad was fastened around his waist like a cup from baseball. Nevertheless, he ran out anyway, his hair still a mess and most of his armor still not fastened on correctly. He zoomed past Zoë, who literally screamed at his appearance and ran after him, shouting that he tidy up, mixed in with very colorful language that sent some of the other staff reeling. Ignoring her, the Archangel continued to sprint, his bare feet slapping against the surprisingly frigid marble floor, until he reached the Great Hall.

            Thankfully, the normal bustling traffic was minimal due to the fact that it was a Sunday, but Chiron dropped his clipboard, which he usually carried around with him and hurried to help Zoë make the Archangel presentable. “Urgent message…from Raphael…” he stopped to take a deep breath.

            “You’re supposed to have an interview today with the CEO of _The Daily Disciple_ today! You look horrendous! Do you really want this wretched outfit to be printed onto parchment and delivered to every angel in all the seven Heavens?!” Chiron demanded as he fastened the straps for his breastplate behind him, making it very uncomfortably tight.

            “I can only agree!” Zoë replied and began to lace up the sandals that she had fetched for him. “Barefoot! My good Lord are you trying to make a fool out of yourself?” She viciously brushed the knots out of his hair.

            “OW!” he yelped as she nearly yanked out a large clump of his blond locks.

            “You should have brushed it better!” Zoë demanded harshly. It was very amusing how Zoë treated Archangel Michael more like a son than an employer, which was very unlike most of his other workers.

            “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah that’s not the point-”

“ _Dignified_ dialect, Michael!” Chiron snapped. “You are not a dim-witted teenage human boy!” Michael composed himself.

            “Please excuse me for the inconvenience,” he told them, “but I need to use an Iris message in private, please.” They both nodded and excused themselves. Now properly attired, the Archangel strode over to a fountain of holy water. He held out his hand and golden sparks danced on his palms, sending up a spray of blessed water.

            “Show me the assembled fallen angels, and make it two-way,” he told the forming mist and an image began to take shape. It was blurry at first, a roiling white mass. But as the image focused and sharpened, it was really, to Archangel Michael’s utter astonishment, a horde of fallen angels all clad in black. There were at least a hundred of them, maybe even more, all gathered around three, now four figures. One of them was clearly the head honcho, and when all of the others began to take notice of the iris message, they alerted him first.

            Michael came face-to-face with Perseus. His green eyes were just as sharp and intelligent as he remembered them, but the humor that they usually held was gone. The three other figures turned to reveal none other than Piper McLean and Rachel Elizabeth Dare. He vividly remembered their trials, but the other person was one that he was unfamiliar with.

            “Archangel Michael,” Perseus announced, his voice echoing throughout the Great Hall. “We have come to ask a favor of you, and I can promise that it will save your life, as well as the lives of countless others.”


	19. Light Bursting Forth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the support, and sorry if I haven't replied to your comments; my computer doesn't allow me to do it for some reason. But thank all of you.

            Rachel Elizabeth Dare didn’t exist.

            She wasn’t a registered citizen of California.

            Wasn’t a registered citizen of the United States.

            Hell, she technically wasn’t even a registered citizen of Earth.

            It was as if she’d, well, crash-landed and taken up home there, but unlike other fallen angels, who withered and wilted without their divine powers and who would most certainly sulk until Judgement Day, she decided to make the most of her damnation to Earth. Many wayward angels feared the Three Strikes, too much to try to do anything significant in the world. The Three Strikes were an unspoken set of laws that everyone in Heaven had to obey; three big mistakes (and we’re talking _big_ ) and your sorry ass gets tossed into Hell.

            Rachel had one strike; she’d descended to Earth unauthorized and, unaware of the effects of her powers as a fire angel on the environment, had consequentially caused Mount Vesuvius to blow up and kill everyone in Pompeii. That had cost her wings and her place in the Heavenly Host. Now, if she wanted to get a second strike (which she most certainly didn’t), she’d use her leftover angelic strength and the ability to summon small flames, unlike the infernos she used to summon, to get past security and light up the biggest oil reserves in the world, leaving the poor, poor humans without their precious fuel to destroy everything. She’d be banished to limbo, a sort of Great Value version of Heaven for all nonbelievers (only if, at their hearts, they truly didn’t want to go to Heaven or have an awesome afterlife), and could only sit and do nothing for the rest of eternity. Her third strike, which would take her to Hell, would mean rallying all the souls in limbo and causing a riot. Then she’d go have a little chat with Lucifer about her behavior.

            In truth, Heaven was very merciful. Like, to the point where they were borderline being a bunch of pussies. It was really, really hard to be banished to Hell, but a lot of fallen angels had been banished to limbo (Which is where Adolf the death angel went after he decided to become leader of a fascist German government just for shits and giggles and wound up slaughtering millions. He no doubt has become one of the few to be banished to Hell).

            But then there’s a Big Mistake.

            There have been only a handful of recorded Big Mistakes, but the angels who’ve committed it, even on accident, get thrown straight downstairs without Earth and limbo in between. Big Mistakes include joining Lucifer, like many angels did in the two Wars in Heaven, and wiping out ninety percent of life on Earth (Looking at you, fire angel who sent the asteroid to kill the dinosaurs because you thought they were ugly). So, all in all, angels do _not_ always stay evil because they don’t want to be drop-kicked into Satan’s bubble bath.

            Rachel, though she was wary of them, didn’t live in constant fear of the Three Strikes, and she made sure that none of her fallen angels did, either. Many had grown to fear her, for she’d amassed something akin to a fallen angel army that would be very, very destructive if unleashed upon the world. The redhead had decided that if she was doing something wrong by helping these fallen angels and keeping them together in a group, then Heaven would tell her. So far, she hadn’t gotten any scrolls from messenger angels, so all was well. She did, though, hear a lot of gossip about her that circulated around the ranks of her army. Stories of how she was the most powerful fallen angel who walked the Earth, and that Heaven was too scared that she’d get angry if they banished her to limbo.

            Of course, she laughed all of this off. If anything, she was Puff the Magic Dragon compared to some of the other fallen angels that were still permitted to walk the Earth. Even so, the rumors about her age weren’t necessarily rumors. Aside from the fact that she was the sister of the Archangels, many of the rumors were true. Rachel, along with a group of other fire angels called the Ancients, had come before the wheel and the fire, she had _been_ the fire, blazing through the planet unrequited. Then the Archangels had pulled her and the other Ancients off of the charred remains and the Creator began to create the land, the seas, and the animals. There are several versions of this story, but all of them had the same general idea.

            Rachel remembered when there were no beings on this planet, her planet, besides fire and molten rock. Despite the fact that she frowned upon how the humans were now treating the planet, it was better than being utterly isolated, with nothing but the crackling of flames, the shifting of rock, and the silence. The other Ancients had all been off on their own, leaving Rachel my herself, and she was pretty sure that nothing in the world compared to how powerful she’d felt then. Or how alone. She felt a twinge of longing for those days, the simplicity of it, because now the world was all tangled up and complicated, though she couldn’t deny that companionship was quite the perk.

            Back to the Three Strikes, though; there were exceptions. These exceptions included Percy’s friends, who were dragged to Hell by demons, and the plan that she, Percy, Reyna, Piper, and the rest of her fallen angels were executing right now, and as of that moment they were not going to go to Hell in the ‘we’re-going-to-save-our-friends-and-this-is-temporary-cause-he’s-going-to-bring-us-back’ way, they were going to go in the ‘oh-shit-we’ve-angered-an-Archangel-fucking-shit-hide-before-he-finds-us’ way. Percy was talking up Archangel Michael, who occasionally cast a wary glance back at Rachel, who he undoubtedly recognized, and even though Percy sounded convincing, things weren’t looking too good.

            The fallen messenger was now fumbling his hold on the hook that had ensnared the Archangel’s attention, which had been caught by marching all of Rachel’s fallen angels as if they were off to war. His confident voice wavered every time Michael disagreed or prohibited something, and he was currently prohibiting transporting all of them into Hell. He claimed it was too dangerous, that they would never make it out alive. When asked if he’d just let Lilith have her way, he’d claimed that the Archangels had it all under control. But, judging from the shocked look on his face whenever he recovered a piece of information, it was quite obvious that Heaven had had no idea that Lilith had risen in the first place. Though Percy was oblivious, Rachel, and many other fallen angels could see that Michael was totally being a mother hen to Percy. It didn’t matter that the world was safe, it mattered that Percy didn’t commit suicide via Queen of Hell. It had turned into an argument; roughly one hundred fallen angels’ wills against the wall of a single Archangel, who was so stubborn that he counted for at least one hundred-one people.

            “You cannot call upon me as if I were a taxi. I am an Archangel and you are fallen angels, and I certainly will not be doing any favors for you,” Michael bellowed, his blue eyes blazing. Many, including Reyna, Piper, and Grover, took several steps back at the head Archangel’s rage. After all, his power was only matched by that of the Creator Himself; you didn’t want to make him angry. Rachel and Percy, however, were unfazed by this. Percy due to the fact that he had worked for Michael for hundreds of years, and Rachel due to the fact that she simply didn’t give a crap.

            “He’s turning us down out of pride,” Clarisse scoffed into Rachel’s ear. “He doesn’t want his image ruined; he’d rather do it himself than have a bunch of fallen angels do it for him.”

            “No he’s totally crushing on Percy and doesn’t want his little mate-to-be to get hurt,” Rachel replied flatly, and Clarisse withdrew sharply like she’d been slapped. She watched Percy and Michel argue for a few minutes before saying:

            “Holy fuck you’re right.”

            Rachel nodded smugly, but her expression fell as she actually studied the argument and not the way Michael’s eyes were filled with concern for his messenger and how he was blushing. Percy was still standing his ground, but only barely, as if he were a wall and Michael was a battering ram. Percy may be good, but Michael was an expert speaker, asking important questions that Percy couldn’t answer and other whatnot. Percy could only withstand it for so long. Rachel, fed up with the Archangel’s stubbornness, walked over and proceeded to shove Percy out of the way. The fallen messenger angel stumbled and was caught by Piper, who gave him another dose of heroin for his strength. Rachel straightened as Michael looked right past her and watched with wide eyes as Percy took the dose, clearly freaking out with worry. It was cute, but they had to get down to business.

            “I was currently conversing with my former messenger,” he snapped, clearly agitated at Rachel’s audacity. The fallen fire angel, not affected by Archangel Michael’s rage in the slightest, simply shrugged. She analyzed the situation; bribes and threats wouldn’t work in this situation, but maybe guilt trips would.

            “Your former messenger, by the way, is dying,” she snorted and crossed her arms stubbornly over her chest. “And if we don’t get him back into Heaven in time, he’ll probably go into the Eternal Healing Slumber.” Rachel saw the Archangel blanch a considerable amount. _Jackpot,_ she thought rather smugly. Rachel specialized in striking nerves of people. All she needed was a little backstory and a light amount of information and she could make anyone concerned. Archangel Michael, however, was shaking his head and grinding his teeth together.

            “There is no such thing!” he bellowed furiously. “No such thing at all!”

            “Are you sure?” Rachel asked vaguely, all the humor fading from her voice. “Are you very, very sure?” The redhead delighted in watching him juggle his choices and doubt himself more and more. It was all rather amusing, for you could see his look of distress plain on his face. Even so, she softened, “I know you don’t want to open the portal into Hell. I know that if you help us your brothers, being the dicks they are, will never let you live it down. But hey, just pretend you’re casting us all into Hell for being naughty.”

            “That's true. My younger brothers _are_ dicks,” Michael replied, shrugging, the iciness in his voice slowly fading as he pondered the situation. “But I can’t cast you into Hell without proof. That's really the only law I’d be breaking.”

            “Fine,” Rachel snorted and drew her gun, pointing it at the screen. “I’m going to kill you.” In a lower voice she added, “According to one of Metatron’s tablets, which I am too lazy to cite properly, making direct threats to Archangels is considered a crime that is punishable by being directly cast into Hell. Is that enough proof for you?” A ghost of a smile flitted across the Archangel’s face, but it disappeared as soon as it had come.

            “You know that if I cast you into Hell, I can’t bring you back unless I go on a one hundred day hearing and have the Council come to a unanimous decision. If even one person objects you can’t come back, and one hundred days is like centuries in Hell,” he told them all, his face stony. Nervous murmurs were exchanged throughout the ranks of fallen angels. Even Clarisse seemed slightly anxious, and she was one of the most battle-hardened angels of power of all time.

            “I have an idea,” she told him. “I can’t tell you or else you’ll say no.” The Archangel opened his mouth to argue, but Rachel held up her hand for silence. “We’ll be defeating Lilith, saving a few innocents, _and_ getting Percy’s wings back. Is there really any downside if we succeed?” she asked. Archangel Michael was at a loss for words; his mouth opened and closed like a fish, but nothing came out.

            With a fed-up scoff he said, “Fine. But I’ll cast you into Hell if you don’t come back.” Rachel was about to tell him that they would already be in Hell if they didn’t come back, but, after much reluctance, decided against it. The Archangel snapped his fingers and all of a sudden the ground under them began to shake, splintering and rumbling. The iris message dissipated into mist as fiery lines began to etch into the ground under the assembled fallen angels’ feet, and a circle of fire closed them in. The flames roared twenty feet into the sky, burning a deep red as they stretched towards the stars, crackling and blazing. It took Rachel a few moments to realize that the lines under them formed a pentagram.

            As the ground began to open up beneath their feet, Rachel yelled, “SAY WHEE!” whilst throwing her hands in the air and giving out a laugh of delight as they began to hurtle into the darkness below them.

            All what she got in reply was a chorus of terrified, “AAAHHHHHHHH!”s

 

\----Ω----

 

            It was difficult enough to clean up after Lilith. It was even more difficult when several hundred people came toppling out of your mistress’s fireplace. Nico had long since concluded that the day could not get any worse. The Watcher had been condemned to be ripped to shreds by a pack of Lilith’s prized hellhounds and Will had had puncture marks like a vampire’s in his neck. Other than that, no damage had been done. Even so, Nico had been scared out of his mind, thinking about all of the things that the Watcher could have done to Will, who’d been given a five day leave from work in order to heal up.

            Nico, unsurprisingly, despised being a manservant; he had to clean the windows, polish the floors, prepare, serve, and clean up after meals, and clean out the fire places when they had been burned out. Very nitty-gritty kind of tasks that Lilith wouldn’t like to do herself, which annoyed him to absolutely no end. The highlight of his day as of that moment was the fact that he was cleaning out the fireplace in the parlor, where Annabeth was working. The two of them didn’t speak to each other, what with their guards sitting and chatting on the couch nearby, but it was comforting to be close to a friend, working side by side. Since cleaning out the fireplace was his last chores for the day, he took it slow, making every movement either deliberate or clumsy; sometimes accidentally spilling out the assembled ashes he’d gathered and having to start all over again. Annabeth notice this and smiled softly, and it took all of Nico’s effort not to smile back, lest the guards notice. He didn’t like the fact that his hands were black from the ashes, though, because he really had an itch on his nose that he had to scratch.

            With Will in the servants’ quarters sleeping off his encounter with the Watcher, Nico rarely ever encountered any of his friends in the halls. Though all of them retired to the same room after, they were all so exhausted that they couldn’t enjoy each other’s company before passing out on their lumpy mattresses. Gwen worked mostly outside in the garden, so he rarely saw her, and Dakota and Leo worked mostly in Luke’s wing of the palace. Annabeth, of course, stayed only in the parlor, so that left he and Will to be the ones to work at Lilith’s wing. For the last few days, though, Nico had been alone.

            The worst part of his life now was seeing Asmodeus, because that meant that he had to see Jason. Tethered to the Prince of Hell by a leash and forced to follow him around everywhere certainly didn’t have a pleasant effect on his sanity, especially because he relied on Asmodeus to take care of him, which he was doing a poor job of. Jason’s eyes were sunken and dull, like the eyes of the dead, while his skin was sallow and pasty from lack of sunlight; every now and then Nico and everyone else were allowed outside to get some fresh air, but not Jason. No, he was kept in the bedroom to be bent over whenever his master pleased. The day after the Watcher attack, Jason had been confined to the bedroom, and on the rare occasions he was brought out he looked marginally worse and worse. The fallen angel was beginning to worry. It was clear that Asmodeus had broken him severely, like a child would break a toy, but the only question is if he could ever be fixed again.

            Asmodeus used his powers to make Jason willing, but he’d used too much of it and it was now rotting Jason from the inside out. He could barely walk, barely move, and Nico, though he heard the headboard slamming against the wall, heard no sound coming from Jason when he passed Asmodeus’s quarters. It was terrible. Nico always tried to catch his friend’s eye, always tried to speak to him telepathically, but whenever he asked him to blink twice or crack his knuckles to show if he heard him, there was never a reply. Jason’s fragile sanity had finally bitten the dust after all the pressure that had been asserted upon him, and sometimes it was better that way. Nico was sure that it was best for him to be insane and able to block everything out, then to have to endure the grueling torture that Asmodeus inflicted upon him.

            That day had been even harsher than the rest. Nico’s guard, a husky Familiar, began to pace angrily back and forth as Nico cleaned out the fireplace at snail speed. Familiars were spirits, often in the form of animals, which were associated with witchcraft. This particular Familiar was named, surprisingly, Carmen. She usually took on the form of a great tiger that was twice the normal size, her skin made of wisps of silver-white vapor that swirled and shifted as she moved. Carmen, though, did not like slackers, and had stopped talking with Annabeth’s monitor when she realized that Nico was taking pretty damn long to clean out the fireplace.

            “Move faster!”

            “Scrub harder!”

            “Hurry up!”

            Those were probably her three favorite and probably only phrases that she could speak. Whenever he disobeyed she would run through him, which felt like his blood was turning to ice and his skin was turning to dust. Nico’s hands were covered in ashes and blistered to the point of ugliness at the moment, but he didn’t care much since he’d been with Annabeth for the entire time, but now it was time to actually work, lest he suffer Carmen’s wrath. The fireplace was huge, and it usually took at least two hours to clean it without slacking. During this time he would go through several bouts of cursing, which Carmen let slide since she liked suffering, and would always come back feeling drained and exhausted.

            That day, however was going to be different. Carmen became bored very easily, and was currently trying to eat some of the apples on a silver platter, but her jaws kept going through it. Nico, scoffing to himself at her short attention span, was just about to wipe off the last of the soot when all of sudden, without the slightest provocation, a fire blazed to life. Nico stumbled back, shocked, while Carmen raised her head in alarm.

            “Scrub harder!” she roared in fright. “Move faster!” This would have been amusing if the fire hadn’t started arcing as high as the ceiling, blazing up like the Trojan wall. All of a sudden, a red-headed girl tumbled out of the blaze, chuckling to herself. She rose to her feet, her sharp, intelligent green eyes meeting Nico’s, and all at once he knew who this was; Rachel Elizabeth Dare. The notorious fallen fire angel. But how was she down here? Had she gotten a Third Strike? She was covered in ash and soot, and her hair stuck out all over the place. Despite this, she grinned.

            “It’s a long story,” she told Nico with a hard clap on the back, giving him a quick once-over as she smirked. “Nice outfit.” Before he could reply, Carmen gave a mighty roar and charged towards them. The fallen death angel gave out a yelp of fright, but Rachel just raised her hand nonchalantly and the Familiar burst into flames, which dissipated and left her nothing more than a pile of dust. Fallen fire angels could only conjure small flames, but Familiars were very, very vulnerable towards fire.

            “What-” Nico began, but Rachel cut him off.

            “Rescue mission,” the fallen fire angel told him with a smile that was too cheerful for the situation. Nico was at a loss for words; how was this possible? Was it a dream? A joke? Some form of eidolon demon playing tricks on him? The flames were still bellowing out of the fireplace, and someone that was not very friendly was bound to hear it sooner or later. He was just about to tell Rachel where all the other people were when Annabeth’s demon guard let out a shrill bellow and charged towards them like a bull, horns leveled and ready to skewer them, but a knife leapt from the blaze and plunged through his neck before he could get very far. He was dead before he hit the floor. Nico and Annabeth turned simultaneously to see Percy tumble out of the fire and smack his head on the couch.

            “Ugh,” said Percy, rubbing his head. He regarded his surroundings blearily before his gaze fell upon Annabeth, and his face visibly lit up. He grinned lopsidedly at her, and Annabeth flushed red at her appearance, trying to pull down her skirt and make it grow to a more respectable length.

            “Perce?” Nico squeaked, disregarding the fact that Annabeth’s reaction had made him self-conscious about his current outfit despite the fact that he wasn't body shy. He flushed a deep red and tried not to make eye contact. “How?”

            “Don’t get your hopes up. I’ve been taking more heroin. It’s keeping me alive,” the fallen messenger angel sighed sadly as he rose to his feet, dusting himself off, which was a rather vain effort.

            “Well thanks for the good news,” Nico snapped. “Is it just the two of you?” Percy had just opened his mouth to reply when several other people came hurtling out of the fire. Then more. And more. The flames spouted about one hundred people, most of which being fallen angels. Nico was so flabbergasted he couldn’t speak, only watch as the fires died down and dissipated into nothing, and luckily the parlor was large enough to hold every one, all who were looking around with something akin to wonder on their face. They certainly didn’t look like an elite team that had descended to Hell to help save their friends.

            “Nice outfit,” Piper snickered, which snapped him out of his daze, and he flipped her off.

            “We’ve already established that,” he snarled, flushing yet a deeper shade of red. He looked around at the small army that had been assembled, their faces hard with determination but still rather curious as they sized up their surroundings. “C’mon, I’ll show you where the others are.” And with that, they were off. Their footsteps rang through the halls like the thudding of hooves, a stampede that would plow down anything in their way. Any demon servant of Lilith’s didn’t stand a chance as a rain of gunfire showered upon them, their last look of terror still frozen on their faces as their bodies turned to shadow.

            The paintings on the walls trembled, the floorboards sounded as if they were dying as they bent under the weight of hundreds of feet, and Nico couldn’t help but let the hope blossom in his chest. As long as they steered away from Lilith, they could get anything accomplished. He led the horde as he veered around corners and took secret passageways as shortcuts to the other members of the Golden Swords. As they emerged into the garden, everyone was forced to lie low as they walked out into exposed land.

            Nico couldn’t say that it wasn’t beautiful. Aside from the gloomy, gothic, obsidian palace that loomed and glittered sinisterly in the faint light, it was actually very grand. Lilies the colors of fire shot from the ground and stretched their petals to the sky, their leaves rustling in the slight wind. It was very strange, since you wouldn’t think Hell would be able to have wind, but Nico knew that it was probably leftover from the hurricanes raging in the Second Circle. The grass, though, was not green but rather a deep red, complementing the greyish stalactites that hung like spears from the ceiling of the huge cavern that was the Ninth Circe of Hell, or the jagged stalagmites that jut from the ground like spires.

            The militia passed a tangled mass of thorns as long as Nico’s pinky and black roses the size of dinner plates. The fallen death angel was pretty sure that the thorns were poisonous as well, due to the fact that green liquid oozed from them. They crept by an assortment of beautiful plant life, including silver tulips that shone like metal, dancing in the slight breeze that whistled through the leaves. There were also red honeysuckles that smelled sickly sweet, but closer up they noticed that it oozed a yellowish liquid that sizzled when it touched the ground. Towering sunflowers the size of a well-built man seemed to scrape the stalactites above, their electric blue petals the size of Nico’s fist. A small pond wove through the assortment of strange flowers, but instead of being water it was thick, molten rock that moved slowly along. Surprisingly, black water lilies and lily pads floated on the surface, giving off an incredibly enticing aroma that was so potent it made Nico dizzy.

            Finally he was able to locate Gwen, who was tending to hydrangeas the color of blood. She had looked more than astonished; she was shocked, unable to form words at the sight of hundreds of fallen angels that had come to rescue her. The fact that she was finding trouble speaking was good, because just then her demon guard strode from their cover in a thick bush with black leaves, only to be blasted to smithereens by roughly a hundred handguns.

            “How-” Piper shushed her with a finger to the lips, looking around warily as she did so.

            “Three down, Four to go.” Nico was well aware that they were in the open, that anyone above would be able to see them, but he pushed the thought aside as if it were an annoying pest; he couldn’t afford to think negatively. A second’s hesitation might cost his friends’ lives. His heart slammed against his ribcage as they maneuvered through the gardens with him in the lead, surprisingly stealthy for a horde one hundred strong. He knew that they’d have to split up eventually, both to recover his friends more quickly and to make sure that they weren’t rounded up and caught like a herd of cattle, and as soon as they reached the cover of the indoors, he split the group in half. Fifty or so in each group, and he sent the other off to find Dakota and Leo while he marched his own to Asmodeus’s quarters. Fallen angels were beyond stealthy, and unlike the massive cacophony that the floorboards had made when they’d first started out, their feet barely made a sound when they touched the floor. He knew that facing a Prince of Hell was a big deal, but with guns armed with Stygian Iron, Celestial Bronze, and Imperial Gold bullets, there was next to nothing that they couldn’t bring down. The only exceptions were probably the Archangels, including the one that had fallen from grace (aka Lucifer).

            Despite their incredible sneakiness, several times they confronted guards on their normal patrol, who wouldn’t live to tell the tale about how he looked down about fifty gun barrels that were all wielded by fallen angels. Along the way, they passed the servant’s quarters, and Nico immediately disarmed the cameras there before tiptoeing inside and shaking Will awake. He didn’t have to be told twice as Will outstretched his arms and asked quietly to be carried. The wound on his neck was throbbing, oozing pus and blood, and his skin had taken on a deathly pallor. Nico thought his heart was going to burst at the not-so-reassuring sight of his boyfriend, and he held Will close as the group continued on.

            Will buried his face into Nico’s neck, his breathing labored, but his eyes were still bright and sparkling with determination. His eyes told him that he wasn't going to die easily, but his body told a different story altogether, and that worried Nico to no end. He held Will tightly against his chest, glad to show intimacy without being punished by Carmen or Minos, and the blond-haired human plant a kiss on the fallen angel’s forehead, which was incredibly difficult in the current position they were in. A warm, tingling sensation spread through Nico’ body and that, along with the adrenaline pumping through his veins, fueled his determination, and as another guard’s body hit the floor and crumbled to ash, he realized just how tenderly he loved Will. How he was willing to spend the rest of his life at the human’s side. Will seemed to reciprocate the feelings and the small black box that he’d kept in the sock drawer of his old apartment weighted heavily in his mind. He decided that yes, after this whole dilemma he was going to propose, and then they’d live happily ever after. Even if thing seemed to be going right, though, he was beginning to become quite nervous; there were security cameras all around the building that zoomed in on them whenever they passed. If that was the case, then why hadn’t Lilith pounced yet?

            They came to a halt at Asmodeus’s door, and when Rachel made a move to enter, he stopped her.

            “Terrible, terrible things go on behind that door, Rach,” Nico whispered, handing Will over to her, and he was glad that her fallen angel strength made it possible to carry someone as tall as Will with ease. It would’ve been embarrassing for both of them if she’d dropped him. “Jason needs to see people he knows care about him.”

            “I understand,” Rachel replied, but she most clearly didn’t. She didn’t know the horrors that his friend had been subjected to, the awful dehumanization; every layer stripped away until there was nothing left but a pet to follow you around all lovesick no matter how much you kicked and beat it into submission. Nico sensed the death that was lingering here, sensed the soul desperately trying to break free of the shell of a body that it was shackled to, but unable to do so, and it made him want to be sick as he slowly shouldered the door open. Asmodeus was not in his room, thank God, but that was suspicious since he was always in his room, however that thought was immediately shoved to the back of his mind as he regarded the small lump in the sheets. He approached slowly, unwilling to startle Jason and make him even more fearful than he already was.

            “Jason?” he called out softly, and the lump didn’t respond, though he hadn’t really expected it to. It wasn’t moving, and if Nico hadn’t been a death angel, he would be absolutely sure that Jason was dead, which would’ve been better for him in the long run. But no, his soul, shining weakly from all of the times it’d been beaten and battered, was curled low in his abdomen, screaming for freedom. Begging for death. Knowing better than to try and call out his friend’s name again, Nico stopped at the edge of the bed and slowly peeled away the blanket. He tried to ignore how thin his friend was, how abused he looked. His body had been used too much, and too roughly. He was meant for gentle touches, not the ones that were exacted upon him by Asmodeus.

            He found a blanket that would be sufficient enough and wrapped it around Jason’s shoulders, picking him up like he was made of fine china and would shatter if he handled him the wrong way. He was limp, his eyes open but blank. His soul had retreated deep inside of him, seeking refuge from all of the torture, and its light pulsed a little with curiosity as Nico’s angelic grace caressed it, soothing it and promising clear skies ahead. It was too feeble to go to Nico’s grace, so the grace had to come to it. Nico shared his power, feeding Jason’s soul directly, and was filled with relief as it began to shine with the brilliance that he’d seen beforehand.

            Nobody asked questions as he emerged with Jason in his arms, who was wearing nothing but a blanket, and signaled for them to continue on. Piper sidled up to him, watching with a clear expression of pain on her face as she regarded Jason’s blank stare.

            “He’s not dead, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Nico told her.

            “I know that,” Piper snapped, wiping furiously at her eyes in an attempt to put a stopper on the flow of tears that were dripping down her face, but with little success. “I can hear his heart beating. It’s weak, though. He’s just a little broken, that’s all. I can fix him, I know I can.” The last part was mostly to herself, and he put Jason into her arms almost immediately after she offered them. He opted to take Will back from Rachel, and was relieved to see his boyfriend sitting up in his arms and looking around, his skin returning to its natural color. The wound still looked horrendous, and he wondered if Piper would be able to heal it, though a healing angel, especially a fallen one’s, powers could only extend so far when it came to the world of magical injuries.

            Out of sheer luck, they met up with the other group at Luke’s quarters, who’d managed to get Leo and Dakota with minimal casualties on the guards’ part; the less deaths on the opponent’s side, the less suspicious they’ll be until the storm hits. Nico had no doubt that Lilith was aware of their presence and was waiting for them; it explained why Asmodeus hadn’t been with Jason, since he’d gone to regroup with his mother and await confrontation with the enemy. Percy had been a part of the second group, and Nico could see just how much Jason’s state was affecting him by the tightness in his face and the way he refused to look at the human’s limp form in Piper’s arms. Leo and Dakota were grim, and Annabeth whispered something to Percy, who grimaced and shook his head, screwing his eyes shut and willing away the tears that were no doubt going to come along. He didn’t draw away when Annabeth’s fingers wound into his.

            As they rammed down the unsuspecting guards at the doors and entered the next wing of the palace, Nico could clearly sense change. Luke’s quarters were more modern than Lilith’s old-fashioned ones, though both on the outside looked like gothic-style cathedrals. Rather than torches set at intervals, this one had electric lighting, and the walls were painted more vibrant colors than white, black, grey, and brown. Nico, belonging to Lilith rather than Luke, didn’t know this place much, and faltered when they came to the first crossroads. He gladly stepped back so Leo and Dakota could take over, but not before they almost knocked over a very valuable-looking vase. It was eerily silent, unlike Lilith’s wing of the palace where guards and other servants could be heard shuffling about on all the different floors. No, this place was completely silent, which made their near-silent footfalls on the linoleum seem like gunshots.

            That’s when Nico began to see them; black feathers scattered throughout the house. The first one Nico saw was nestled gently on the floor, but was soon sent spiraling into the air as Piper shuffled past it with Jason in her arms. She’d suggested that she find an abandoned corner and heal Will and Jason to the best of her ability, but Nico pointed out that if she was jumped all three of them would be goners. The black feathers continued to show up in all of the most normal places, one on an end table, and another on a chair. Nobody had made any effort to clean them up, and it was almost as if Luke were marking his territory with Percy’s feathers, which made Nico’s blood boil. He could see that Percy was having difficulty controlling his rage, and not even Annabeth’s comforting hand on his arm could seem to soothe him as his feathers showed up in his enemy’s house. Nico was so distracted in thinking up how many ways he was going to kill Luke that he nearly crashed into Leo when the human stopped dead at the threshold of the parlor. Whispers immediately erupted amongst the group. Why did they stop? What was in the parlor?  Rachel silenced them all with a look, and they resorted to just exchanging incredibly nervous glances with one another.

            “Guys, it’s time,” Dakota told him, the Imperial Gold dagger that they’d given him sliding from his sleeve. “We gotta kick their asses.”

            “Best luck to all,” Percy stated, his expression solemn but his eyes glinting with a predatory light as he regarded the man who’d taken everything away from him.

            Apparently Luke, Asmodeus, Minos, and Lilith had decided that they’d had enough with the small army’s sneaking around. All four of them were standing in front of the fireplace, facing away from them, but everyone was well aware of the fact that they knew exactly where they were at all times, the feeling of being watched making Nico’s skin prickle. The fire cast ghastly shadows across their faces, and the arching ceiling was so high up that it seemed to disappear off into the sky, which made the room seem more like a ballroom than a parlor. Jason stirred a bit at Asmodeus’s presence, blinking weakly, and Piper shushed him when he tried to speak, though Nico could see his trembling through the blanket. Asmodeus’s fags glinted in the firelight as he grinned to himself, and Nico’s anger leapt in outrage at the fact that the Prince of Hell thought this was funny. Luke’s blue eyes were blazing with fury, his wings, _Percy’s_ wings, fluffing up in defense as they shifted against his back. It was almost like they knew when they were in the presence of their real owner, and Nico prayed that they’d just magically rip from his back and attach to Perseus, because he couldn’t bear the sight of his best friend’s wings on someone else.

            Minos seemed more interested in the fire than he did in the army of fallen angels, and the Lilith simply looked amused as she twirled a Stygian Iron knife in her fingers, her black eyes glittering with intelligence. Annabeth and Percy balked a little at the sight of Luke, both who’d been exploited by him, but they were wearing a matching set of withering glares that were both trained at the traitor. Nico saw Percy’s fists clench at the sight of his enemies, and he, too, felt a surge of anger. No words had to be exchanged, the image before them said quite enough. The fallen angels drew their weapons and charged into battle against four of the most powerful beings in Hell.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Percy snarled as he and Luke circled around each other, baring their teeth and gripping their weapons tightly in clenched fists. The chaos raged around them as guards swarmed through the doors, and cries of triumph and pain echoed throughout the gigantic hall. Luke spread his wings, Percy’s wings, and demanded submission, though Percy doubted that the human really knew the wing language as he grinned wickedly. He wasn’t going to just lay down and die, though, and he raised his Celestial Bronze sword, three feet of polished, leaf shaped metal that he was starting to grow attached to, and beckoned Luke forwards. He didn’t seem interested all that much, though, and Percy grimaced when he opted to take the psychological route.

            “Are you willing to sacrifice all of those who have joined your cause? How far is too far?” Luke jeered as a beautiful, blond-haired fallen angel fell to the ground, covered in demon blood that burned and sizzled like acid, and she crumbled into dust.

            “Silena!” came a horrified cry from somewhere in the fray, and Percy felt bile rising up in his throat at the thought that that fallen angel had had friends who were like family, that she’d had a good life in store if they won. The fallen angels were holding their own, but guards were swarming through the doors. Familiars, demons, wraiths, you name it. Hell was spewing out everything that it had to offer, and there was no doubt that the army would wane eventually For every enemy cut down, ten more replaced it. _Their_ army, however, only had a single amount, and when that ran out there was no one left to replace it. Luke seemed to read Percy’s thoughts, for his smile became even more twisted as the two continued to circle, none of them making the first move.

            Luke spread his black wings to their full length, and the feathers gleamed like oil in the sickly yellow light of the electric chandelier that swayed lazily above. “You want these back? Come get em’.” Percy felt fury crashing down upon him like a wave. The voices of the addiction were swamped by a torrent of crashing emotions that all circled around a single point: rage. Rage like white hot fire seared his skin and gave him strength, and all the hatred that he had felt towards Luke burst out in an explosion of light. Luke was thrown into the far wall, letting out a shout of astonishment as his head smacked against the surface. The impact should have broken his neck, but Percy watched in horror as Luke brought up his hands and turned his head forward, the number 6-6-6 emitting a sinister black glow.

            The mortal that was no longer a mortal rose to his feet, his blue eyes now all black; empty, endless pits that seemed to suck in all the light around them. They said the eyes were the windows to the soul, and if that was the case then Luke’s soul was nonexistent. He was now a demon, a sickening creature that had been shaped and formed at the hands of Lilith, mutated to form the perfect warrior, the ultimate fighting machine. Luke let out a spine-tingling roar that made all heads turn for a fraction of a second, though the fighting resumed almost immediately. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Lilith smiling wickedly as two fallen angels attempted to knife her in the back, but to no prevail as she flicked her wrist and they both were swept off their feet. She didn’t seem to have a single scratch on her.

 That’s when Percy saw Rachel, struggling against Asmodeus as her eyes blazed with licking tongues of fire, and Piper, desperately trying to revive a brown-haired fallen angel that was slowly crumbling into dust in her hands. Nico was fighting valiantly against Minos, with Will propped up against the wall behind him looking sickly and a motionless Jason lying in his lap. His jaw was clenched and he was doing very well in fending off the Prince of Hell, but his movements were becoming more sluggish as he tired. His heart leapt with relief as Reyna ran over to aid him, her Imperial Gold sword glinting in the light. Leo an the fallen angel Calypso were warding off a demon with skin like chalk and sharp, needle-like teeth side by side with Gwen and Dakota, who fought as one against a Familiar that had taken the form of a fire-breathing dragon.

            Then his eyes came to rest on Annabeth. She’d joined Rachel in her fight against Asmodeus, and he couldn’t help but feel a little twinge of pride in his heart as she, a human, bested a Prince of Hell in battle. Though Asmodeus was swift and lithe, his swings were clumsy, and Percy was well aware of the fact that the Prince of Hell was too busy sleeping with people to really perfect his battle strategy. Percy’s eyes slid to Jason, who looked hollow. His eyes were blank and stared off into nothing, and he was gaunt and trembling; Percy could easily count his ribs through his shirt from his spot at least five feet away, and he felt almost as empty as Jason looked. At least the blond was still sane enough to feel emotion, though depending on what he went through that wasn’t really a good thing.

            Luke took advantage of Percy’s distraction and tackled him, and the fallen angel’s head smacked painfully against the floor. He saw stars for a few moments, black spots consuming his vision, before he let out a bellow that sounded feral even to his own ears and pummeled the demon’s chest with his knees as they rolled on the ground, blood splattering and knives flashing. Luke let out a grunt and staggered back, black blood oozing around a knife wound in his arm and from a cut on his cheek. Percy was no better. In fact, he was worse. Luke’s blood had spilled onto the left side of his face and it burned like hellfire as it sizzled and popped. Percy let out a moan of pain and held his hand against his face, inhaling sharply as he felt the skin disintegrating under his fingers, the agony spiking to a point of unbearableness. Unable to see through his left eye, Percy felt that he was now at an extreme disadvantage. Luke had his wings, acid-like blood, and was protected by Satan himself. How would he possibly be able to defeat him?

            He heard the rage of battle around him and thickened with resolve. He would tear Luke apart, piece by piece, starting with his wings, if it was the las thing he did. He wouldn’t let all this loss of life be for absolutely nothing. His odds weren’t looking good, though, since his sword was corroding as the demon blood dripped and sizzled on it, so he tossed it to the floor and his hand hovered over his handgun. _No. Later,_ he told himself and his hand moved to grasp another knife that was waiting. Luke’s knife had clattered into the battle, and he was now rendered weaponless, though Percy was pretty sure that the demon was not at all helpless. Just as he predicted, Luke crouched and sprang at him like a deadly panther, his fingernails elongating into jagged black claws and fangs springing from his mouth. Had he rolled away a second later, he would’ve been a Percy pancake as Luke landed so hard the floor splintered beneath him.

            The demon turned, his obsidian black eyes filled with such hate that it sent tingles racing up and down Percy’s spine, and it was at that moment he wished for the blue eyes again, even if those blue eyes still plagued his nightmares. Luke advanced, but their fight was interrupted, however, when a horrible shriek ripped through the air, and Percy was able to turn just in time to see Nico run Minos through with his Stygian Iron sword. The Prince of Hell let out another bellow before crumbling to ash, which was scattered by the scuffling of hundreds of feet. Luke turned and bared his teeth, which were now serrated fangs that looked strong enough to snap bone.

            Without a second’s hesitation, Percy charged towards Luke, and though Luke was fast, Percy was faster. He tried to dodge, but Percy swerved at the last second and caught the monster’s leg with the edge of blade. Black blood wept from the wound, the spots on the floor that it landed on disintegrating, and Percy was careful to avoid it as he wiped off his knife with a part of his shirt, which crumbled to dust. Thankfully, though, the blade was still intact. Luke, who’d staggered back in pain at the wound, recovered quickly and, without warning, smacked Percy with one of his wings. One would think that wings were soft and delicate, with hollow bones and the like, but maybe that applied to birds alone.

            Angelic wings were weapons, great for bludgeoning any attackers with enough force to crack a sidewalk, and the fallen messenger angel heard the alarming snap that came along with his neck breaking as he was thrown into a wall. His heard slammed against his ribcage desperately as he struggled to stay conscious; he couldn’t move or breathe, and blackness was slowly creeping across his vision as he clung to life. He tried to force the darkness back, tried to remain coherent; one he went into the Healing Slumber, he was as good as dead, helpless in its purest form. It was a losing battle, though, as his brains screamed for him to breathe as his lungs refused to work and his heart began to fail. He felt the shadow of Luke falling over him and the rough, ragged breathing of the thing that used to be a human. Percy’s eyes fluttered, and his heart raced, but he knew that it was over. He gasped for air, but it didn’t come and the beating of his heart began to become feebler and feebler. That’s when he heard a cry of outrage and an astonished grunt as Annabeth leaped onto the beast, her knife flashing. Piper sprinted over and placed her hands on Percy’s neck, and he let out a squeak of pain as green sparks trailed from her fingers and his neck mended itself.

            “I know it hurts,” she whispered as Percy began to struggle, the pain becoming too much to bear. “I know, I know, I know, it’ll be over soon, just stay with me.” Will staggered Piper’s side, looking a little worse for wear, with Nico not far behind, his shirt slick with the dark crimson, plasma-like blood of a wraith. She turned to them, her kaleidoscopic eyes glinting, and ordered, “Nico, I can watch over Will. He’s going to help me with Percy, but you need to go help Annabeth with Luke.” Nico hesitated, casting a concerned glanced towards Will, but obeyed, rushing back into the fray with his Stygian Iron sword held high, the demonic metal resistant to the blood of the monsters that it was created by. “Hey, hey, hey, stay with us,” the fallen healing angel murmured to Percy as he began to nod off, desperately trying to keep him awake, but the black spots began to make his vision blur and tilt. “Will! Keep him awake while I heal him, he _cannot_ fall asleep. No matter how much he begs you, he is _not_ allowed.” She looked up to see a fallen angel fell a Familiar with a clean cut of his weapon. “You there!” He looked up, startled and jogged towards them.

            “What’s your name?” she asked seriously, her sparking hands still on Percy’s neck as she continued to try and help heal him.

            “Travis,” he replied, flinching a bit as another faceless fallen angel was stabbed in the chest.

            “Okay, Travis. Nice to meet you. Make sure I don’t get maimed by demons, ‘kay?”

            The fallen angel didn’t need to be told twice as he hacked through two disgusting snakelike demons with ram’s horns that, instead of spewing acid-like blood everywhere, covered him in a layer of thick green slime that didn’t do much of anything except smell. Percy moaned and he began to close his eyes, but Will smacked him and his eyelids snapped open once more.

            “Don’t fall asleep, Perce! Concentrate on my voice, make it your anchor point to keep you with us. I’m not sure if we’re winning or losing, but,” Will, paused, looking around, “the demons just keep coming. It’s like a hydra, when you cut off one head, two grow back. We’re running low on bullets and knives, and Lilith and Luke are both still standing. Speaking of Luke, he’s getting his ass kicked by Annabeth and Nico as of this moment. Nico is, well, a hunk, and Annabeth is a lunatic with a knife, even in a slutty maid outfit.” Percy laughed at this, but it morphed into a groan as his insides hurt.

            “Almost done,” Piper announced, the green sparks still trailing from her hands. “Keep talking, Will.”

            “Travis just destroyed two Familiars at once with a single knife, but that knife is now lodged in the wall. He only has one left now, and that could easily be corroded by demon blood. Jason is staying behind with Leo and Calypso to guard him, and Dakota and Gwen and holding their own against a gorgon.” Though it was mostly good news, Will’s voice was tinged with worry. Percy struggled to keep his eyes open, but his eyelids were becoming ever so heavier. Will saw his drowsiness and quickly resumed talking, “Rachel, Clarisse, and Grover are all taking on Lilith, but that woman has some sort of freaky-ass shield that protects her. None of their blows actually hit her; they just bounce off. Rachel just shot her but that bullet ricocheted off and killed an eidolon demon that was impersonating a rat-”

            “Done!” Piper told them exhaustedly. Percy could see the heavy bags under her eyes. If she kept using her powers to this extent, she would burn herself out completely. Fallen angels, unlike full-fledged angels, only had a limited power supply that had to recharge with time, and if Piper didn’t stop now she’d kill herself. But Percy couldn’t dwell on that now, and he leapt to his feet and shoved through the mass of writhing bodies locked into battle with one another, all the way towards Luke, Nico, and Annabeth. For a human, Annabeth was holding out surprisingly well, all she boasted was a busted lip while black blood was gushing from wounds across Luke. Nico didn’t have a scratch on him, and they were taking turns lunging at the enraged beats, who didn’t have enough space to fly around and really take advantage, though his wings were thrashing around and dangerously close to send someone else flying.

            As soon as he saw Percy, Nico fled, no doubt to get back to Will, and even though Percy needed all of the help he could get, he was glad that Nico cared about Will so much. He deserved to be happy with someone. Thoughts aside, Percy ran up behind Luke, who was very much occupied by the fact that Annabeth had reopened the scar that he’d gotten from one of the angels he’d hunted, and drove his knife through his spine. Luke arched back and roared, swatting at the fallen messenger angel with a clawed hand and desperately struggling to get the knife, which was slowly decaying, out of his back. His wings beat dangerously, sending any demon and fallen angel in the vicinity toppling with a single swipe. Percy knew he should’ve chopped them off when he had the element of surprise on his side, but he’d have to saw off the whole wing, which took time. There went his last knife, and Luke growled warily as Percy drew his gun, which was loaded with demon blood resistant Stygian Iron bullets. He was glad that he’d chosen it over the Celestial Bronze or Imperial Gold shooting ones.

            Annabeth locked gazes with him, and some sort of understanding passed between the two. They both leapt at Luke, who was taken by surprise as the weight of two bodies crashed into him, and Percy hissed in pain as Luke’s blood slathered all over his leg. He realized, belatedly, that Piper had also healed the side of his face that had been caught by Luke’s blood, and he could see fully out of his left eye now, which was a blessing considering he needed all the sight that he could get. Almost immediately after jumping him to offset his balance, they retreated and began circling, searching for openings to attack. Luke, frustrated but still crafty, snapped at the place where Annabeth was just standing, and Percy flinched at the sickening click of his teeth that could easily rip through flesh. Annabeth, unfazed, was smaller than Luke but still very strong and lithe, and she darted around him, landing blows wherever she could find and opening. Luke had grown marginally taller since Percy had last seen him, and stood about eight feet tall, though Percy’s wings were now pathetically small for him, being that the fallen messenger angel was only six foot; even an Archangel’s wings weren’t meant to go on a guy who was eight feet tall.

            The three locked into a deadly dance, and the one who fumbled their footing would be the one to die first. This was bad, considering Percy fucking sucked at dancing. Luke, despite the fact that large demons were usually depicted as slow and dumb, was actually inhumanly fast and infinitely intelligent, faking to one side and then attacking from the other. However, there were two of them and only one of him, so it was going to go down either way. Percy saw Jason slumped at the sidelines with Leo and Calypso fending off a drakon who thought the blond would make a very nice snack, and Piper had hustled over with Nico and Will to try and revive him, but despite the green sparks his blue eyes were still incredibly dull and lifeless. The fallen messenger angel hardened. Whoever tortured his friends was going to pay with their lives. He fired his gun twice, both of them burrowing into Luke’s knees. The monster bellowed and Lilith screamed, “My champion!”

            _For fuck’s sake, lady,_ Percy scoffed in his head, enjoying the rush of adrenaline that surged through his veins.

            The Queen of Hell tried to run over, but she was blocked by a swarm of fallen angels, all with gleaming knives and murderous looks on their faces. She bared her teeth and held up her hand, blasting through the ranks and tossing them like ragdolls into the walls. Dread curled low in Percy’s stomach as Lilith stroke over in a flurry of fabric and clicking heels, her smile saying ‘happy’ but her eyes saying ‘I will fucking stab a bitch if you put another finger on him’. She strode over, unchallenged, with everyone else watching from the sidelines, and Percy saw, surprisingly, that the flow of guards had been stopped for some odd reason, and there were much fewer demons than there had been before. Luke made an effort to try and join her at her side, but the bullets in his legs made it near impossible, and he crumbled to the ground. Percy grabbed a fallen and semi-intact Stygian Iron blade and leapt onto Luke’s back, the weapon level with Luke’s, _his_ , wings. Lilith stopped almost immediately, her sickly sweet smile contorting into a nasty scowl. The fighting resumed.

            “Come any closer and I hack off his wings,” Percy snarled, his blade gleaming. He’d planned on doing it anyway, but now was not the time. Annabeth took a step towards, her face hard with fury, when all of a sudden Jason started screaming. Piper let out a cry of shock as he convulsed, writhing.

            “You even poke mamma’s champion’s wings with that little toy of yours and I’ll grind your friend here’s brain to dust,” Asmodeus snarled, stepping away from the crowd with eyes like burning coals. “I’ve already had my way with him. He’s useless now.” He squeezed his fist tighter and Jason’s cries rose into terrifying screeches of agony.

            “MAKE IT STOP!” he sobbed as he clutched his head, his fingernails leaving crescent indents in his skin. Asmodeus released his grip and Jason’s cries ceased as he collapsed, weeping silently. Piper was at his side, cradling him in her arms and kissing his forehead as tears dripped down his cheeks. The fallen healing angel gave the Prince of Hell a look of pure hatred as she hugged the blond-haired boy tightly against her chest. They were at a stalemate. Percy knew that if he chopped off Luke’s wings, Asmodeus would crush Jason’s mind as if it were a bug, and if Asmodeus crushed Jason’s mind, he’d chop off Luke’s wings. There was no getting around it, and it was all over a stupid pair of wings. He didn’t think that even his return to Heaven was worth what they'd gone through to get his wings, and the realization came to him rather belatedly.

            That’s when they came. A stream of creatures flowed into the room, their eyes cut horizontally and blood leaking from their tear sacs. Their clothes were spattered with crimson stains, and their hands and feet were gnarled and disgusting, though they were neatly folded in front of them.

            _We have come, Lilith,_ they said, though their mouths did not move.

            “No, not possible! How did you get in here? Guards!” No demons came to answer her plea as Grover hacked down the last demon, a Minotaur, and it dissipated into nothingness

            _They are gone. We have sealed this place off from the rest of the world._ Percy was dumbstruck; he had never seen Watchers before. He’d read about them extensively on Metatron’s tablets and had done a project on them at school, but never did he think that he’d actually encounter them. Then he realized something; Watchers were solitary creatures and only gathered if they were there to collect a new member, so that meant that someone in the room...

            Will crumbled to his knees, screaming as the Watchers tilted their heads to the side in unison, which was a horrifying sight if he ever saw one. Nico looked horrified as he ran over to try and help, but Will held up a hand and silently begged him not to come closer as he clawed at his face. His hands became contorted and mangled, his fingernails suddenly elongated, and they left deep cuts in the skin as Will’s tears of agony turned to streams of blood.

            “NO!” Nico screamed as horizontal slits carved themselves over Will’s eyelids. The blond boy screamed and screamed and screamed, writhing on the floor as two bite marks stood out against his neck. Will had been bitten, and now he was to cry out all his sins in pain and agony until he turned to dust. The weight of it crashed down on Percy’s shoulders, and Annabeth had to steady him as his knees threatened to buckle. “Will! Will!” Nico was sobbing on his knees beside his boyfriend, who was still shuddering and weeping blood. Then it stopped, and Will rose to his feet, jagged lines carved into his chalk-white face. His expression was almost…serene, and Nico rose with him, desperately clutching his boyfriend’s shoulders as if he could shake the infection out of him.          

            “Will…”

            _I’m sorry, Nico. I am a monster now._ Will told him sadly, his lips pursing as he wrapped his arms around the fallen death angel, who clutched him tightly as if he were going to disappear into thin air. _I cannot join you in your fight any longer, I must go with them._ He nodded towards the other Watchers as droplets of blood, more than what the other Watchers were crying, splattered onto his shirt. _I am sorry._ Tears were steaming down Nico’s face as everyone watched, horrorstruck. Lilith’s mouth was opening and closing like a fish’s, but no words were coming out, and if Percy hadn’t been wallowing in grief he would’ve taken pride in her speechlessness. Instead, sorrow like a tidal wave smacked into Percy and he staggered back a little as Will drew away from Nico and took his place amongst the other Watchers, who handed him a white cloak that he wrapped around his shoulders. _I am blessed to have been able to love you like no other, Nico. I will remember you until the day I turn to dust, but I also know more than anything. I can see the past, the present, and the future, but I need you to promise me one thing, Nico._

“Anything, anything!” Nico wailed. Will managed a sad smile as more blood dripped onto his clothes.

            _Don’t hide. Live. Do not dwell on my memory, love others and give them what you gave to me._ Will sighed, bending his head. _I love you Nico. I wish you could be with me, but the Watchers cannot Turn a fallen angel who has not been cast into Hell. Again, I will love you always._ He walked over and placed his knife into Nico’s hand, and the fallen death angel clutched it as if his life depended on it. Then he joined the ranks of the Watchers, who bent their heads in acknowledgement. _But first, allow us to do you a favor._ The ground began to shake as Will and the rest of the Watchers raised their hands. Percy realized, with horror, that the Watchers were some of the most powerful beings in the universe, the original angels that had fallen from Heaven with Lucifer and were now crying out their sins. They could do anything they wanted, and he shielded Annabeth with his body as plaster began to rain from the ceiling and a low rumble resonated from somewhere deep in the earth.

            “This is all your fault, Lilith!” Nico bellowed and large cracks began to open up in the ground, fissures that seemed to have no bottom. His eyes were glowing with the angelic powers that he’d once possessed, and Percy was shocked to find that he was actually aiding the Watchers, their powers fusing into one. The fear on Lilith, Luke, and Asmodeus’s faces was plain and there for all to see.  “If you hadn’t captured us, the love of my life would’ve never been bitten!” A large crack opened up between Lilith and Asmodeus’s feet, and they looked up in unison, horror written all over their faces. “You two have fun rotting in the pit with Lucifer,” Nico told them coldly and the crevice swallowed the demons up, closing and sealing itself so that it was nothing more than a small crack in the floor. The Watchers had disappeared, and when Nico looked behind himself, expecting to still see Will there, all the power seemed to leave him and he crumbled to his knees, clutching Will’s knife against his chest and rocking back and forth.

            “Mistress!” Luke cried, his voice as if a snake were talking instead of a human. Percy had had enough. He whirled on the blond demon as the rest of the ranks closed in. Luke tried to fight back, but it was no use as people raised their knives and their handguns. Percy was in the lead, his green eyes sparkling murderously and a crooked smile splitting his face like the fissure that had swallowed up Lilith.

            “You will pay,” he snarled as he advanced, the other fallen angels behind him with equally homicidal expressions on their face. Percy raised his knife to Luke’s throat and looked at the wings behind him. “I’m going to need those back.”

           


	20. The Angels Sing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter of Black Feathers. I have a sequel already written out and completed, and I can't wait to share it with you all.

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_One day after the rescue._

            After we used the hidden portal in Lilith’s palace to get out of Hell, we all sort of expected that the earthly air would make Jason perk up a little, but we shouldn’t’ve gotten our hopes up. Annabeth told me to keep this log so we could track his progress, and right now I am saying that we will need a miracle to get back the Jason that we once knew. Asmodeus really beat him into the ground. He won’t talk. He won’t even look at me. I feed him by hand because he’s too weak to feed himself, and he bleeds when he goes to the bathroom. He won’t let me touch him, and at least he’s making use of his newfound free will, but other than that he is merely a shell with a soul caged inside of it.

            Several times he has gestured that he wants a gun to shoot himself. A rope to hang himself. I won’t let that happen, though, but it’s difficult to see the man of your dreams begging for death. He needs to get better first, and then if he truly thinks that the world is too rotten to live in, I will, grudgingly, allow him to take his own life. It’s the little steps, though, and as I sit next to Jason writing this he is screaming out in his sleep. I can’t wake him in case he becomes more freaked out by the contact. Until next time.

 

\----

 

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_Five days after the rescue_

 

            Jason has become coherent enough to start refusing the food I give him. He’s sitting up by himself, even taking in his surroundings a little when he thinks I’m not paying attention, but he’s like a Weeping Angel from Doctor Who. He only moves when you don’t look at him. When you _do_ look at him and he notices you looking at him, he completely shuts down. Refuses to make eye contact and turns towards the wall. It’s like he’s afraid of us, is terrified that if he dares to look us in the eye we’ll beat him within an inch of his life. I don’t doubt that Asmodeus did something like that to him. He dutifully makes sure that I know that he _does not_ want to eat by denying me when I try to feed him by hand, and whenever I set the plate down in front of him to see if he’s more comfortable feeding himself, he just stares at it dejectedly. Once, I tried to see if he’d eat if I left, but I returned to find the contents of that day’s breakfast scattered across the room and the plate in pieces on the floor. Jason didn’t answer when I asked him what happened, but he most certainly didn’t eat anything before he threw the plate. He’s so broken I don’t know what to do. More updates to come.

 

\----

 

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_One week after the rescue_

            I’ve tried everything. From bringing in other people to visit to completely leaving him to his own devices. Nothing is working. He grudgingly allowed me to feed him when I held up an NG tube and gave him an ultimatum, but even then he choked down the food quickly so he could return to doing his favorite hobby other than sleeping or staring at the wall; pretending I don’t exist. I’ve tried demanding, begging, blackmailing, asking nicely, and everything in between, but he still refuses to talk and look me in the eye. His mind is shutting down despite the fact that his body is slowly healing. As soon as we called, Thalia was over here in the blink of an eye, and despite the fact that she seems a bit incredulous at the story, the sight of Percy and Annabeth doing wing therapy together certainly blew away all of her suspicions that the supernatural don’t exist.  

            Do you know how awful it is to tell a fretting older sister that her younger brother may not make it through the month? I brought Nico in to talk to Jason, but the fallen death angel had to leave, crying silently. Jason’s soul must’ve been a sight; so beaten down and abused that there was no possible way for it to perk back up again. By the end of the sixth day I allowed Thalia to start visiting, with strict orders for her to not touch him, and I can only pray that Jason decides to choose this world and not the next one.

 

\----

 

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_A week and a half after the rescue_

I have just walked in on a miracle. I was about to tell Thalia that her time with Jason was up (and I really did hate forcing her out, but Jason’s body language has expressed that he gets incredibly uncomfortable when there’s more than one person in the room), when I saw Thalia holding Jason’s hand, massaging his knuckles with her thumb and whispering caring things to him, and Jason was sitting up and _looking at her._ He wasn't screaming bloody murder at the touch, like he’d done for the past several days whenever my hand accidentally brushed over his skin, and I quickly retreated back into the hall as to make sure that that contact was strained for as long as possible. To pass the time I’ve decided to add things to this log and make a new entry for this event. Doodling in the margins is nice, too…

 

\----

 

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_Two weeks after the rescue_

            Jason is recovering with leaps and bounds. He’s still a little hesitant about anyone but Thalia touching him, but he will hold my hand if I offer it. He’s started looking at people now, though he’ll close himself off if anyone new enters the room (Thank god I’ve slowly introduced all of the gang throughout these past few days so that he’s comfortable with everyone), and he’s started to read to pass the time. We tried wheeling in a TV but Jason was scared half to death by the noise and the flashing lights, but we’re perfectly fine with taking it slow. He still hasn’t uttered a word, and I’m beginning to worry that he’ll never speak again, but I have to put that behind me and concentrate on all the progress rather than the setbacks.

 

\----

 

**Piper McLean’s Log**

_Two and a half weeks after the rescue_

            Jason has just asked me, “What the hell do you do in that notebook of yours that you’re always writing stuff down?” Needless to say, I was so startled that he actually started to laugh, and I felt like either laughing with him or crying my eyeballs out with relief. He’s become so responsive now, so unlike the husk of a person that he’d been just two weeks ago, and it’s started to feel like it was just a terrible, terrible dream. It’s incredible to have to take Jason off of the suicide watch list after so many hours wondering if he was going to find some way to off himself when no one was looking. Jason seems surprised at his recovery, too, and is constantly asking people questions about everything.

            _How’s Percy doing?_

_Did someone stitch his wings back on?_

_How long was I out?_

_Are Percy and Annabeth dating?_

            _How is Nico handling without Will?_ (I was surprised he even remembered that)

_Can I see Dakota and Gwen?_

            Sometimes you wish he’s just shut up already, but I’m more than grateful that he’s catching up with all the days he missed talking. He’s probably going to talk until the end of eternity. Oops I accidentally said that last thing out loud and now he’s giving me the stink eye. Perhaps when he’s ready I’ll let him read this so he can be rejuvenated by his own comeback story. With the ego he has, I won’t be surprised. Oops, I “accidentally” said that last thing out loud, too, and now he’s threatening me. He still has yet to walk without assistance, but now I can genuinely say that I’m not all that concerned with it.

 

\----Ω----

 

            “Wow,” Jason stated, closing the notebook and placing it off to the side. He wrapped his arms around Piper’s middle and rested his chin on her shoulder as she read one of the comic books that he’d been so enthralled with over the past few days. “That was intense. You really thought I was going to die?”

            “Yup,” Piper replied evenly, her eyes never leaving the page, but her lips quirked slightly. “I was devastated.”

            “Yeah, ‘cause you won’t be able to see my gorgeous face every day,” Jason retorted, and Piper cried out indignantly as he tickled her sides a little. “You know that part of the reason you loved taking care of me is because I’m smoking hot.”

            “Oh, shut up!” Piper grouched and thwacked him lightly with the rolled up comic book, but not before she placed a chaste kiss on his cheek. “We both know that’s not true.”

            “You sure about that?” he chastised, hugging her tightly. “Because you always tell me I’m good-looking.”

            “That is true,” Piper admitted, and they both lapsed into a comfortable silence.

            It was only quiet for about five minutes before Jason stated, “I’m hungry.”

            “Of course you are.”

 

\----Ω----

 

**ONE DAY AFTER THE RESCUE…**

            Percy woke to brightly lights and hushed murmurs. His mind was foggy, his head pulsing with pain that was only slightly tolerable, and he felt like he’d been hit by a speeding SUV fifty times. That was nothing compared to the steady ache that was assaulting his back, and he groaned and fluttered his wings slightly as he hauled himself into a sitting position. The voices were silent as Percy yawned and stretched, blinking away the black spots that danced in front of his eyes and trying to ease the vertigo that had come along with the movement. Then he stopped dead, his heart leaping in his chest as he moved one wing. Then the other. Annabeth was only barely able to get to him in time as he slumped forwards, sobbing into her shoulder as he wrapped his beloved wings around himself.

            Annabeth whispered comforting words into his ears and wrapped her arms around him as he cried tears of joy. Never in his life, not even when he was accepted as Archangel Michael’s messenger, had he been so utterly joyful. He felt like he’d left his body and was floating weightlessly in some sort of dream, but the ache of his wounds told him otherwise, and that made him all the more happier. When he was finally able to calm down and sit up by himself, he immediately took to preening himself. He never thought he’d be so glad to perform an action that had once been a chore, and he whistled to himself as he plucked out all of the shed, bent, or damaged feathers that may have gotten lodged in with his healthy feathers. Annabeth sat down on a folding chair that was positioned next to the operating table that Percy was sitting on, and Percy realized, with a jolt, just how worse for wear she looked.

            “You okay?” he asked as he managed to wrestle out a particularly crooked and stubborn primary feather, allowing it to spiral to the ground.

            “Just tired,” she groaned in reply, running a hand down her face. “I didn’t sleep.” This set Percy on high alert, and his eyebrows climbed up towards his hairline as he regarded the disgruntled-looking blonde with a critical green gaze.

            “Annabeth, you just served as Lilith’s parlor made for a day, which must’ve felt like weeks, months even,” the messenger angel told her seriously, his lips thinning. “You need to rest up.”

            “I had to make sure you were alright, Percy,” Annabeth insisted, her grey eyes daring Percy to argue. More and more he saw similarities between her and General Athena, and he wasn't sure if it was hot or just all-out terrifying. “I had to stitch your wings back on meticulously, keep you knocked out with enough morphine to kill ten people, and then make sure that your body didn’t reject them and all the muscles, bones and tissues were replaced. They should work as good as new, but just in case I’m going to put you through a little therapy course that I literally made up five hours before you woke up.”

            “Well, I’m fine now. Do us both a favor and get some shut eye,” Percy replied gently, a smile touching his lips. “I promise I’ll be right here when you wake up.” Annabeth’s eyes were drooping, and she nodded almost mechanically as she trudged out of the room and towards what Percy could only assume was her quarters in the Golden Swords’ facility. Even with messy hair, shadows under her eyes, and wrinkled clothes that were three sizes too big, she was still the most beautiful person he’d ever seen. His heart clenched a bit when he realized what was happening. Nobody could blame him, really; she was beautiful in every way, had a heart of gold, had helped him get back on his feet when he thought that there was really no reason to live at all, and had even faced Lilith for him. Now she’d sewed his wings back on and was suggesting doing therapy with him to help him recover. He was in love. The thought sent a jolt through him and made him want to leap for joy and wallow in despair at the same time. It was great because at least he knew that he was capable of love after all that had happened, but he’d fallen in love with someone who he could never be with.

            The angels would know right away and he’d have to be cast out of Heaven for good. No brakes or take-backs. He'd have Annabeth and all his friends, sure, but he'd be miserable; he’d gotten his wings back only to lose them again. When he finally got back to Heaven, he’d probably assume his position as Michael’s messenger again and would finally be able to see his parents again. God, he missed them so much. He’d be rid of his addiction to heroin, which had calmed somewhat after the overdose on morphine, and could live his life as he once did. Only, he wouldn’t be able to see any one of his friends ever again. Annabeth, Jason, and the rest of the Golden Swords were mortal and were said to be unworthy of divine witness unless it was decreed by the Creator himself. Nico, Piper, and Calypso were fallen and couldn’t be interacted with at all, a law that had been in motion since Lucifer had rebelled from Heaven. He’d be alone. He’d have Archangel Michael, but he needed some friends that he didn’t have to work for. Perhaps he could get to know the messenger who’d replaced him during his time of absence, but the mere thought of having to leave everyone else behind made his stomach churn.

Just when he thought he was about to break down, Nico slipped into the room with a grin on his face. Percy couldn’t help but return it with his own smile.

“God, I missed these,” Nico murmured, mostly to himself as he carded his fingers through the downy feathers. To Percy, he asked, “How are you holding up?”

            “I’m great, actually,” Percy responded, but his face fell. “At least for now, while I’m still able to talk with you guys.” Nico frowned, drawing away from Percy’s wings so he could sit in the chair that Annabeth had occupied beforehand.

            “I suggest you try not to think about that,” the fallen death angel replied. “But hey, we saved the world. Maybe Heaven will give us a free pass or something.”

            “Maybe,” Percy replied, but he knew that that probably wasn’t going to happen. Nico knew it too, but he was just trying to cheer the messenger up. “How’s everyone else?”

            “That’s what I came in here to tell you,” Nico told him, clearly glad to change the subject, “I’ll start with the good stuff. Leo and Calypso really hit it off and have a date scheduled for when everyone is back on feet, and Rachel and her fallen angels have decided to join up with the Golden Swords, but instead of hunting angels we’re going to help them. Sure, some of them still hold a grudge towards the people who hacked off their wings, but in time they’ll forgive. Sadly, all of the wings had been sold beforehand so there weren’t any ones to return to their rightful owners.”

            “That sucks,” Percy grunted, his brow furrowing. He didn’t think that that was fair, and he hoped that they were in the process of tracking down all those pairs of wings, though he doubted they’d be able to get them back because A) the people they sold them to were criminals B) the criminals paid money for those wings and C) the Golden Swords didn’t ask for names for keep records and descriptions of the people they sold their wings to. “How bad were the casualties?”

            “They held a service for those who died while you were out cold,” Nico answered solemnly, his mouth contorting into a grimace. “And that brings us into the bad stuff. Among the deceased included Silena Beauregard and Travis Stoll. Travis had been the one who fought to protect us as we healed your broken neck. He would’ve been the only one who was able to get his wings back. We burned them in memoriam.” Nico had gone pale, his lips thin and his eyes haunted, and Percy touched his friend’s shoulder in a gesture of reassurance.

            “Is there any more bad stuff?” he asked, and the look on Nico’s face told the messenger that things were about to get much worse.

            “Jason,” he murmured, and Percy nodded grimly. He knew that Jason would have difficulty recovering from what was inflicted upon him by a Prince of Hell, and it was no surprise that the news about him would be among the ‘bad stuff’. “He’s not doing too well. Won’t look at people. Won’t talk. He’s too weak to feed himself but he’s so scared of people that he doesn’t want others doing it for him. Piper is fighting desperately to save him, but…” He trailed doff, shaking his head and wiping at his eyes a little. Percy understood. Nico had probably seen his soul, had probably seen just own mangled and desperate it was to be free, and Percy hoped that whichever path Jason chose, whether it be the polished, smooth stairway to Heaven or the rough dirt path of Earth, he’d be free from suffering. If he was in Jason’s position, he certainly knew which path he’d want to take, and the thought of it made Percy want to vomit.

            “What about Will? How are you handling it?” he asked, even though he knew that Nico was on the verge of breaking and if there was any question that would make him do so it was this one. Surprisingly, the fallen death angel didn’t dissolve into sobs like Percy thought he would, though a few tears did leak from his eyes, all of which he furiously wiped away.

            “I’m doing well,” his voice cracked, “I just miss him so much.” Percy didn’t waste time in wrapping his arms around his friend, and only then did Nico finally let himself go. He wept silently into Percy’s shoulder, dampening his shirt, but the angel didn’t mind. He spoke soothing words into Nico’s ears, like how he’d try to find Will’s Heaven and talk with him and keep him safe. That calmed the ex-death angel down somewhat, and finally his sobs ebbed and he was able to draw away, rubbing his eyes and the tears that lingered there.

            He and Nico sat in silence for the rest of their time together, simply enjoying each other’s company and reflecting upon their situation until Nico rose and told Percy that he had to go help Rachel organize everything; the fallen fire angel had taken up the job of running things while everything was in chaos, and he thought a helping hand was needed. Percy watched him go and turned on the TV in the corner of the room, and immediately the voice of the newscaster blared to life:

_“We are unsure of how exactly to explain this, perhaps a trick with mirrors and the like, but here you might see a large group of what look like teenagers emerging from a portal in-”_

            Percy smirked and changed the channel.

 

\----Ω----

 

            Excitement was in the air at the headquarters of the Golden Swords, which had just officially become an organization that helped newly fallen angels take refuge and adjust to their new life on Earth. All of the stands and glass cases in trophy room that had once held wings had been cleared to make way for rows and rows of bunk beds, and everyone who lived there contributed to the organization. After a few months, the depression and loss and all of the other bad stuff shed away and made everyone raring to get their jobs done.

            Jason had never felt better, despite his rough patch at the beginning. Sure, not a word about the time he spent in Hell had ever escaped his lips, but that didn’t stop him from wiping the slate clean. Now the day had come, and a pang of sorrow sliced through his heart like a white-hot knife. The wind from the top of the Golden Swords’ tower was picking up, and the tang of an oncoming storm hung thick in the air. Percy had still insisted on this day, no sooner, no later, and everyone was happy for him. But at the same time everyone knew that they would lose yet another friend, just like how they lost Will and Silena and Travis. Jason smiled as he recounted the time leading up to now, and he was grateful for every moment of it. The headquarters had become like a second home, and even Thalia paid them visits when she was not busy with the Hunters of Artemis, which had now risen to such popularity that they had been on several talk shows and even made a hit single, “Orion”, that reached the top charts within just one broadcast on the radio.

            The members of the Golden Swords were now no longer financially burdened, due to a very, very generous donation from the Hunters of Artemis. Everyone was well aware that they couldn’t just hang around and do nothing forever; they had a life to live. They didn’t want to waste away in this God-forsaken city with thugs and Candymen crawling in every shadow; they wanted to be successful like others that lived a good and easy life they could not have.

            After a hearty confession, the other members of the Golden Swords soon found out that Dakota was intoxicated all the time due to the fact that he had been testing the quality of his own beer and alcohol. Dakota had learned to brew alcoholic beverages, and made the best wine that anyone had ever tasted; he planned to open his own winery, called the Bacchus Barracks, in LA.

            Gwen had taken on quite a fondness for flowers after her experience in Hell, and had planted seeds that she had snuck into her pocket, realizing with delight that the beautiful and deadly plants flourished in Earth soil; she was ready to open a flower shop right next to Dakota’s winery, with Grover Underwood as her assistant. In her room were pots full of bluebells that actually chimed when disrupted, hydrangeas that were the color of flames, and black roses that shined brightly in the electric lighting. Everyone was willing for the flowers to be toted out due to the amount of space they took up, but Jason was pretty sure that they would miss them just as much as he would.

            Reyna, still unable to get over the thrill of battle, was going to enlist in the army with Clarisse La Rue, and Jason was pretty sure that they would soon climb the ranks until they emerged out on top. Both of them were excellent warriors as well as leaders that kept their calm even under fire, and both would certainly help protect the nation from those who wished to harm it.

            Leo had met a gorgeous fallen angel of music named Calypso and had immediately been smitten. They had been dating for weeks now, and it was obvious that they were head-over-heels with one another, though they had hated each other at first, each of their conversations always ending with shouting and flying objects (including knives and a banana-rang.) They also planned on opening a shop, though they weren’t very sure where to start yet, even with helpful tips from the other members of the Golden Swords. Everyone in the entire facility shipped them hard, including Jason, and he even went lengths to make Caleo T-shirts as well as Jasper ones; though he abstained from making Solangelo tees, knowing how upset it would make Nico.

            Speaking of whom, Nico was still contemplating on his future. Sure, he was a fallen angel; he had all the time in the world, but did he really just want to hang around while the others moved on with their lives? He was leaning towards staying in the current city and keeping up the Golden Swords; rescuing wayward fallen angels and bringing them to safety with the help of some other of his fallen angel buddies. Jason had told him that this would be a very difficult job; it was already pretty hard with the rest of them there, what happened when they were all gone? Nico had dismissed this of course, saying he had his reasons but did not state them. Jason, however, supposed that it had something to do with Will becoming a Watcher; the fallen death angel wanted to make sure that no other would suffer the same fate.

            Annabeth and Rachel were both applying for an all-girls college in San Francisco, when Annabeth’s parents lived. They certainly had the funds to go well into their Master’s degree, and the blonde ex-angel hunter wanted to become an architect, whereas Rachel desired to be an artist. They’d both be outstanding at what they did, for it was what they wanted to do most, besides the fact that they were both freaking geniuses.

            Piper would resume her post as a nurse/doctor, but she had been promoted only earlier to work at a children’s hospital all the way across country, which she eagerly accepted. Word was getting out about how excellent of a healer Piper was and, despite the fact that she wanted to be an angel of art and beauty, she finally seemed at ease with her position, comfortable in her own skin.

            Jason was going with her. All the way to New York, just for his Pipes. They had officially started dating when Jason finally was able to come to his senses, and he felt that they were off to a good start. Of course he would be leaving everyone behind on the west coast, both his friends and his sister, but he would do anything for Piper, and as long as they were together he was sure that he’d never be alone again. Their plane was scheduled to leave that night at nine, and butterflies were flitting around in his stomach. He hoped that his life in the future would be as good as his life for the past few months.

            All of them had laughed and joked, their ties so strong that they could never be severed. Annabeth had made a move to try and get into a relationship with Percy, who had politely declined, saying that he did, indeed, love her, but in order to return to Heaven he could not be together with anyone. The blonde girl had taken this well, unsurprisingly, but Jason could still see her sneaking longing glances across the room to Percy’s smiling face. Speaking of whom, the black-haired soon-to-be messenger angel had just tottered out of the building and had joined Jason on the roof, his huge black wings catching the weak rays of sunlight that filtered through the clouds, shimmering with a divine light.

            Even with all the happiness in the air, a thick cloud of worry and sorrow still had blanketed everything. Percy had not yet crossed the line between Heaven and Earth, and therefore heroin had to be constantly injected into his veins. He had not caved in yet, but nobody knew how long he would last; his eyes were even more sunken than before and his skin was chalky and sallow. Even so, his green eyes were sparkling with happiness and excitement as he gave a little experimental flutter, rising two inches off the ground and nearly getting swept away by the wind. The others joined them on the roof, and it was then that the grief of Percy’s departure crashed into Jason like a wave. The messenger angel had become more than a friend over the past year, he had become the brother Jason never had, and it seemed like yesterday when Jason had towered over him and tore off his wings.

            Percy could sense his depression and enveloped him in a brotherly hug as a small tear made its way down the blond-haired boy’s face. As they drew away Jason could see just how regal he looked silhouetted against the sky, with his chiseled features and bright eyes, along with that irritating yet sickeningly infectious lopsided grin of his. He soon found himself smiling back and the worried lines that crinkled the messenger angel’s face smoothed out. Percy put a hand on Jason’s shoulder, sighing.

            “Sometimes I think back to when we first met, and I almost appreciate you chopping off and selling my wings in the first place.” He chuckled at the ex-angel hunter’s shocked and bemused expression. “I’m mostly kidding. But still, I wouldn’t’ve been able to go on this entire adventure. I wouldn’t’ve been able to meet you or any of these other wonderful people,” he gestured to the gathering crowd behind him, “and most of all I got a taste of freedom that I never thought I’d have. Thanks, Jase.”

            “No problem,” he replied, trying to keep the waver out of his voice. Jason could see the sadness in Percy’s eyes as he left to join the group of gathered fallen angels and former angel hunters. Percy exchanged short words with almost everyone, and even kissed Annabeth on the forehead, a brotherly gesture of course, but when the blonde girl took her place beside Jason he could see her blushing furiously. His conversation with Nico lasted quite a bit longer, considering how long they had known each other. They exchanged a bro-hug and a couple of laughs as if they were going to see each other tomorrow. But everyone knew that this was not the case. When and if Percy became an angel again, he would not be able to converse with them anymore, especially with Nico, Piper, or Rachel.

            “And don’t let me hear that you were cast out of Heaven two hours after you were accepted back in!” Nico jovially called behind him as he fell back, but Jason could clearly see that his smile did not reach his horribly depressed eyes. The wind began to pick up, and it was unanimously unspoken that it was either now or never. Percy stepped to the edge of the building, looking down nervously. He had only been able to fly in the rooms of the headquarters, and then he was only able to beat his wings once or twice before he had to touch down again. Leo was wringing his hands nervously, Reyna was chewing on her lip, Gwen and Dakota were both breathing quickly, and Annabeth looked terrified. Jason was well aware that she put Percy’s well-being before hers, and without a single doubt did he suppose that Annabeth would jump off the building after him if the takeoff somehow backfired.

            Everyone inhaled sharply as Percy spread his gigantic black wings, which rippled in the howling torrents. The wind pushing against them caused Percy to teeter just slightly on the edge, and the entire crowd gasped. The black-haired boy turned around, smiling as his eyes brimmed with tears. He looked at Jason for just a millisecond and mouthed _Thank You_ before he beat his powerful wings and took off into the clouds, leaving nothing behind but black feathers that spiraled and danced to the ground. 

 

 

**END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Could you leave a comment for the last chapter? Pretty please? :)


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